Can we talk about how beautiful those rainbow carrots are?! You are looking good today, carrots. This stunning roasted carrot dish features warm whole grains, protein-rich chickpeas, spiced pepitas and a light herbed crème fraîche sauce.

Don’t be intimidated by its gourmet looks—this recipe is simple to make once you get going. It has several different components, but none are complicated, and they come together beautifully.

This recipe is an absolutely lovely vegetarian option for your holiday table. Call it a main dish for the vegetarians and a side dish for everyone else. It’s also a well-balanced weeknight or special occasion dinner.

If this recipe looks familiar, it’s because it’s one of my all-time favorites. It even made it into my cookbook with a tahini sauce variation. Today, I’m sharing it again with updated photos and a video so you can watch how it all comes together.

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Let’s talk about farro! Have you tried it? Farro is a whole grain that has been cultivated for thousands of years. In fact, it may be the world’s oldest cultivated grain. We’ve even found it in Egyptian tombs.

I love farro for its reasonably quick cooking time, nutty flavor and satisfying chewy texture. Farro is a hearty addition to salads and soups. It’s especially wonderful with some garlic and olive oil stirred in while it’s still warm.

Farro is a nice alternative to wild rice, brown rice, quinoa and other whole grains. It’s a healthy plant-based source of protein, iron and fiber. As a bonus, it freezes and defrosts well. So, you can make a big batch to enjoy over the next few months.

Today, I’m clearing up some common farro misconceptions and sharing my go-to farro cooking method. Keep on reading for more about farro!

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Another kale salad? Yep. I can’t stop eating this one. It’s full of tender massaged kale, chewy cooked whole grains, tangy crumbled goat cheese, toasted almonds and dried cherries. The vinaigrette is intentionally zippy, and it brings it all together.

This salad is a dead ringer for one of my favorite Kansas City salads, the winter farro salad at French Market. It’s a cozy place with grab-and-go salads, amazing pastries and crêpes. The woman behind the counter typically has a lovely French accent. We often stop there on our way out of town for healthy road snacks.

I’ve become quite enamored with their farro salad. Since it’s labeled “winter,” I thought I’d better come up with a homemade version before it’s too late. Here it is!

This salad would be a wonderful hearty vegetarian option on your Easter table. It also packs great for work lunches and spring picnics. Beware, it’s hard to stop eating it once you start.

Watch How to Make Farro & Kale Salad with Goat Cheese

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Trying to eat better this year? I know, it’s extra-hard when it’s freezing cold outside and delivery pizza is just one call away. This warm, fresh yet hearty salad is the perfect solution. It packs well for lunch, too.

I really love the combination of garlicky farro with roasted cauliflower and salty feta and olives. Farro is an ancient grain related to wheat that you should be able to find in the health section of grocery stores. It’s nutty in flavor, freezes and defrosts well, and offers some heft to salads.

Fresh greens, sliced avocado, and lemon round it out. This seasonless salad is bursting with bold Mediterranean flavors.

You might recognize this salad from the archives. We have a lot of new visitors this year (hello and welcome!), and I’m trying to make sure my favorite recipes have appealing photos.

I love revisiting existing recipes because they give me more creative energy to devote to new recipes. I’m working on a new batch this week and can’t wait to share the results with you.

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The holidays are almost here, but I’ve been eating like it’s Thanksgiving for the past few weeks. Food blogger problems! I’m seeking balance in the meals in between recipe testing by filling my belly with my favorite veggie-packed meals.

Case in point: This sweet potato, kale, chickpea and farro soup, which is both impossible to describe using fewer words. I shared this recipe five years ago, and it’s still one of my favorites.

I’m counting down the minutes until I can heat up a big bowlful of this soup for lunch. It’s spicy, filling, satisfying, and overflowing with so-called power foods and whole grain goodness. The Thai red curry paste might seem like an unlikely pairing for sweet potatoes, kale and farro, but somehow it just works.

I love this soup because each main ingredient contributes flavor while retaining its texture. The farro stays nice and chewy, the chickpeas don’t turn to mush like lentils might, the sweet potatoes retain their delicate bite, and the kale never wilts into nothingness like spinach tends to do.

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I’m going to level with you today. I’ve hardly been able to get myself out of bed lately. It’s a real struggle, every morning, and I operate in a fog until mid-day when I finally snap out of it. Productivity has taken a definite hit, but I swear I’m not depressed—I’ve been there, and this is not that.

Maybe it’s just the winter slump? Can we chalk it up to short daylight hours? Vitamin D deficiency? Cookie and I haven’t been going on our daily walks when it’s so cold outside. Come to think of it, I ran out of multivitamins a few months ago. I’ll buy more today. Recent news events have left me deeply troubled and discouraged, which makes getting out of bed all the more daunting.

Perhaps you can relate. I’m trying to be patient with myself, trying to go to bed at a decent hour, trying to choose veggie-packed meals over nachos (although sometimes I compromise with veggie-covered nachos).

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Sometimes, I like to imagine that I live a more glamorous food blogger existence. One in which lunch is more than a hodgepodge of cookbook leftovers, and I make myself proper dinners every night. This all takes place in my lovely, subway-tiled, self-cleaning kitchen (a girl can dream!).

My reality is far different. I’ve been intensely focused on photographing the breakfast chapter for my cookbook, so I have been living in yoga pants and surviving on scones lately. My dining table has moved to the middle of my living room, and a tripod now stands where my coffee table usually goes. Everything is a mess.

With impeccable timing, Blue Apron offered to send me three meal’s worth of ingredients (two portions each), complete with simple instructions on how to make them. They basically fed me a proper lunch for the first time in a week. It was amazing. I could have cried.

When life gets super busy, it’s so easy for healthy meals to fall by the wayside. Good dinners are more than just fuel—they’re a time to rest, recharge and connect with friends and family. They’re important, and they don’t make themselves.

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Sometimes recipe concepts sit on my list for months, waiting to be made. Sometimes a craving strikes and a corresponding recipe materializes out of thin air—such is the case with this Greek farro salad. It features bold Mediterranean flavors (lemon, herbs, chickpeas, roasted red peppers and feta), tossed with lots of fresh, peppery arugula and warm, chewy whole grain farro. Pass me a fork already!

The best part? This salad keeps well for several days in the fridge with the dressing stored separately, which is always welcome, especially right now. The seasons are changing here in Kansas City, and it’s just too nice outside to stay inside and cook. Let’s soak up all the seventy-degree days we can get!

To that end, I’m keeping this post short and sweet. Do let me know how you like this salad—please comment below! I love hearing how my recipes turn out for you.

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Can we talk about lunch today? Basic, necessary, weekday lunches? I work from home these days, but I learned a thing or two about packed lunches when I was commuting to an office job a few years ago. Even now, I like to keep my lunches really simple, for productivity’s sake.

To state the obvious, lunch is important. Skipping lunch altogether is not a viable option. Coworkers will start giving you funny looks when your head is on the desk and your stomach is growling for help. (I speak from experience.) Also, why skip a perfectly good excuse to eat?

You also can’t completely overdo it at lunch… well, you can, and I totally understand the desire to indulge after a miserable morning. Assuming that your human body functions similarly to my human body, however, choosing fast food with fries or mac and cheese will suck the energy right out of you.

Here’s how it goes: the grease, carbs and all that tasty, tasty salt will probably leave you feeling jazzed for about an hour. Then your eyelids will start to feel verrrrrry heavy. You’ll start fantasizing about crawling under your desk for a little nap. “Will anyone notice?” you’ll wonder. “Just for a few minutes…”

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