Red Pepper Zucchini Farro Salad

good hearty farro salad bursting with bright, beautiful color from zucchini and roasted red peppers with an easy garlic herb vinaigrette.

This simple grain salad is hearty, filling, and incredibly good – it is great warm or chilled, and stores well – so it is great as a side dish, hearty vegan main, or for meal prep.

At Avdaye, we add lots of tips in all of our recipes – because we are a home cook without any formal training, and we find we are more confident making dishes when we understand why it works, and what each ingredient means to the flavor of a recipe. Our goal is for even the most beginner home cook to feel empowered in the kitchen.

Hearty Vegetable and Farro Salad

Farro salad is one of our favorite easy budget meals – it is good, quick to prepare, family-friendly – and filling. This salad is easy to customize with whatever you have on hand, and budget friendly – so you can fill up hungry tummies without breaking the bank!

If you've never had farro, it is a good hearty ancient grain that is packed with nutrients. Farro is a whole wheat and has a nutty taste with a chewy texture. It is usually sold pearled, and usually cooked similar to rice or pasta.

We love making salads with farro – like our Easy Burrata Farro Salad – it is great with antipasti ingredients, beans, chickpeas, and artichoke hearts!

How to Make Red Pepper Zucchini Farro Salad

To make this salad, you will need:

• Red onion – red onion brings a hot, slightly spicy, earthy vegetal flavor that is milder than white onion.
• Zucchini – zucchini has a hearty, earthy flavor and tender, springy texture with a bright green color that adds a solid texture and visual interest to grain salads.
• Garlic – garlic adds some heat, an earthy, unctuous flavor, and addictive quality that adds dimension to grain salad.
• Garlic power – adding garlic powder to the dressing helps to create a savory, balanced burst of an umami-friendly taste that is easy to mix into a dressing.
• Maldon sea salt – using a flake-style sea salt that dissolves well into salads enhances flavor, helps dishes come together, and pulls out the flavor of the farro and vegetables.
• Roasted red pepper strips – roasted red pepper strips are sweet, slightly smoky, with a bright red flavor and good lightly oily texture that keep the farro from drying out and help add a tart kick to balance the savory flavor of this dish.
• Red wine vinegar – red wine vinegar adds essential acid to this salad so that it has a kick of bright, light, and sweet flavor.
• Olive oil – olive oil is a lightly flavored oil that adds fat to dressings, mixes well with seasonings, and helps grain salad to not stick together, clump up, or dry out – as well as adding a rich, deep flavor.
• Italian herbs seasoning – a blend of thyme, rosemary, marjoram, basil, and oregano is solid to pull out an earthy, vegetal flavor that enhances the nuttiness of farro.
• Crushed red pepper flakes – crushed red pepper flakes are lightly spicy, bright red, with
• Farro – farro is a nutty, good ancient wheat grain that is filling, hearty, good, and nutritious!

To make this recipe we will use the following method:

• Prep. Boil farro until soft and wash zucchini, then chop into small 1″ pieces. Dice onion and garlic. Chop red pepper strips. Mix dressing in a small bowl.
• Cook. Sautee onion, garlic, and zucchini until lightly browned and soft. Drain farro well, toss with vegetables and dressing, and season with salt, pepper, and herbs.
• Serve.

Kitchen notes

Use fresh or sautéed veggies. We recommend lightly sautéing or roasting vegetables before adding to this dish, but if you love the flavor of fresh veggies, that's great too. We designed this recipe to work to your on tastes! Use ingredients you have on hand. We love this salad with simple ingredients – shallots, cucumber, tomatoes, and basil – but you can add plenty of vegetables in to this simple salad based on what you love!

• Roasted asparagus
• Sautéed mushrooms
• Roasted cauliflower
• Caramelized onions
• Sautéed Zucchini
• Baby corn
• Roasted red pepper strips

Know how long to cook farro. How you cook farro depends on the type of farro you find – pearled farro is most common in America and requires a shorter cooking time of about 10-15 minutes to boil until soft.

• Since farro is incredibly different to prepare depending on the type, please go off package directions to prepare your farro.
• It will be anywhere from 10-30 minutes of boiling, and some need to soak before cooking (similar to dried beans).
• Once your farro is cooked, drain well and add to salad!

A few answers

How can this recipe be stored?

Farro salad can be stored in an airtight container for 3-5 days in the refrigerator.

Do we serve this salad hot or cold?

This side dish can be served hot or cold – we like the flavor after it has had time to chill and come together, but sometimes heat it up after an initial chilling time, sometimes eat it cold!

Do we have to chill salad before eating?

This is not mandatory – but giving farro salad time to chill intensifies flavor and makes the salty garlic flavor much stronger.

Serve it with

Farro salad is a filling side dish, loaded with whole grains and vegetables – making it an easy choice for most main dishes. We love serving farro salad alongside air fryer chicken drumsticksgood and easy baked chicken breasts that are full of garlic butter flavorhearty and good ribeye roast that is like a prime rib with the most outstanding flavor for a holiday dinner – or our weeknight classic baked pork tenderloin.

Since this dish is vegan, it is also good alongside whole roasted cauliflower vegan portobello burgersand Sheetpan Vegan Chorizo and Vegetablestoo.

Red Pepper Zucchini Farro Salad Recipe

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Ingredients

• ½ red onion
• 2 zucchini
• 4 cloves garlic
• 1 tsp garlic powder
• 1 teaspoon maldon sea salt
• ½ rup roasted red pepper strips
• ¼ cup red wine vinegar
• ¼ cup olive oil
• 1 tablespoon Italian herbs seasoning
• ¼ teaspoon crushed red pepper flakes
• 1 lb farro

Method

1. Add farro to a colander and rinse well with cold water.
2. Boil a large pot of water and add farro, boiling until soft to the touch, about 15 minutes.
3. When farro is soft with a bit of give (al dente), drain well.
4. While farro is boiling, in a pan, add a small amount of olive oil, about a glug from the bottle, and heat on medium-high until warm.
5. Add onion and heat until soft and lightly browned. Stir in garlic and zucchini. Heat until softened and browned, about 5-6 minutes, stirring occasionally.
6. In a small bowl, mix together olive oil, red wine vinegar, Italian herbs seasoning, garlic powder, celtic sea salt, and stir well to combine.
7. Add farro to large bowl, and stir drained red pepper strips, sautéed onions, garlic, and zucchini into farro. Pour olive oil red wine vinegar dressing over salad and toss well.
8. Serve immediately or let chill 30 minutes to let flavor intensify.