Vegetarian Taco Salad

You’ll love this easy-to-make loaded vegetarian taco salad recipe. Protein-rich walnut meat with all the classic toppings of a taco tossed with crisp romaine lettuce and finished with avocado lime dressing. The perfect weeknight dinner or lunch option!

Jump to:

• ❤️About This Recipe
• 🧾Ingredient Notes & Substitutes
• 🎥Watch The Recipe Video
• 👩‍🍳Step By Step Photo Instructions 
• 📋 Recipe Card

❤️About This Recipe

Taco salad is actually a Tex-Mex dish (originated in Texas that’s inspired by Mexican cuisine).

This is a vegetarian taco salad where ground meat (beef) is replaced with vegan walnut taco meat.

Easily customizable: use whatever toppings you like or have available. 

Takes only 30 minutes to prepare. 

Perfect for the summer season so we don’t have to turn on the stove or oven.

Meal Prep (lunch on-the-go): Mix and keep the toppings, lettuce and dressing in different containers and toss everything together right before eating.   

🧾Ingredient Notes & Substitutes

This vegetarian taco salad so easy to customize as per your liking. See the notes and substitute options below

- Romaine lettuce: the crisp romaine lettuce makes the perfect green leafy base for this vegetarian taco salad. You can use iceberg lettuce, but I do not recommend butterhead as it has a soft texture.

- Walnut “meat”: for the vegetarian protein option, I opted for this. But you can use lentil taco meat or softritas instead. Or simply skip this option.

- Black beans: This one is my favorite so I always make a big batch of instant pot black beans and keep them handy for my Mexican night dinners. Instead, you can use pinto beans or kidney beans.

- Sweet corns: I have used simple plain, steamed yellow sweet corn. Instead, you can use corn salsa.

Instead of corn and beans, you can use black bean corn salsa.

- Tomato: I am using grape tomatoes. If using Roma tomatoes then chop them into bite-size pieces and add. Or use cherry tomatoes.

- Tortilla strips: For some crunch, I have used tri-colored tortilla strips. Or you can simply crush the tortilla chips and add. Based on what flavor you’re craving, you can go for flavored Doritos chips.

- Cheese: I am using shredded cheddar. You can use taco blend cheese instead.

- Avocado lime dressing: in the classic taco salad, sour cream and salsa is used. If you want you can opt for that. But I chose to use healthy, creamy avocado lime dressing. 

Other sauce/dressing options are a little amount of chipotle sauce for some kick or queso sauce or ranch.

- Avocado: I have added bite-sized pieces of avocado. You can skip it or use guacamole (only if not using avocado dressing, otherwise both have a creamy texture which doesn’t go well in salad).

- Extras: You can add diced/sliced red onions, diced bell peppers, grated carrot, chopped jalapenos, etc.  

🎥Watch The Recipe Video

👩‍🍳Step By Step Photo Instructions 

Make Walnut “Meat”

1) Dry roast the walnut in a pan on medium heat for 4-5 minutes only with stirring constantly.

2) Add into the food processor along with smoked paprika, chili powder, garlic powder, ground cumin and soy sauce.

3) Pulse it until the mixture becomes crumbly.

4) Do not over-process where it becomes too oily and clumpy.

Make Avocado Lime Dressing:

1) Add all the dressing ingredients into a food processor or blender jar.

2) Blend it until smooth and creamy. Add a tablespoon of water at a time, blend and get the right consistency if it’s too thick.

Make Vegetarian Taco Salad:

1) Place the romaine lettuce in a large bowl.

2) Top with walnut meat, black beans, sweet corns, tomatoes, avocado, cheese, tortilla strips.

3) Drizzle the prepared avocado dressing. 

4) Toss well and serve. 

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📋 Recipe Card