Mediterranean Sweet Potato Salad with Lemon Mint Vinaigrette

Super easy, 10 min prep, 20 min in the oven, this Mediterranean sweet potato salad is a vegetarian dream with flavorful crispy roasted chickpeas, lettuce, cucumber, tomato and dressed in a refreshing lemon mint vinaigrette.

Course Main Course

Cuisine Mediterranean

Diet Vegetarian

Fridge Life? 3 days

Freezable? No

Prep Time 10

Cook Time 20

Total Time 30

Servings

Calories 437kcal

Author Dora

Equipment

Stainless Steel Baking Trays

Ingredients

4 medium sweet potatoes
2 can chickpeas approx 15.5 oz can (430g can)
2 large cucumbers
2 cups cherry tomatoes
½ cup radishes
2 cups lettuce
6 oz feta cheese sheep or goats preferably

Spices for baked sweet potato and chickpeas

2 teaspoon dried cumin
2 teaspoon dried paprika
2 teaspoon garlic powder
1 tsp cinnamon
¼ teaspoon chilli flakes
1 teaspoon olive oil
½ teaspoon salt

Lemon mint vinaigrette

2 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
4 tbsp lemon juice
1 grated garlic clove
2 tsp dried or fresh mint
2 tsp honey
2 tbsp water

US Customary - Metric

Instructions

Preheat the oven to 400ºF (200ºC).
Peel the sweet potatoes and cut into cubes about ½ inch / 1 cm. If serving to a baby for baby-led weaning then do not salt them and cut them thinly the width of two fingers stuck together.
Season with cinnamon, paprika, salt and mix with your hands so each cube is coated. The best would be if you have a big enough baking tray so the sweet potato cubes don't touch and they can get nice and crispy and roast evenly. Then place in the oven.
Prep the chickpeas. If using canned chickpeas, drain them, dry them, and place them on the sheet pan or baking tray. Also, all on one level so they all become crunchy. Season with the remainder of the spices and place in the oven.
(If you are giving this to your baby and toddler you can always have a non seasoned part just in case they reject seasoning.)
Prepare the rest of the vegetables. Wash and cut up the rest of the salad ingredients into little chunks.
Prepare the mint vinaigrette. To grate the garlic I use this simple cheese grater. Then place all the ingredients in a cup and mix them.
Assemble the salad. Allow the chickpeas and sweet potato to a cool a bit then place roasted chickpeas, baked sweet potato, cucumber, tomato, lettuce, radishes in a big bowl. Pour over the mint salad dressing and sprinkle with feta cheese.

Notes

1. How to serve to baby and toddler?

BABIES

Omit salt from the recipe
Omit the dressing (especially due to honey as it can cause botulism)
Omit feta due to high salt content
Omit radishes and lettuce

6 months old baby
- For baby-led weaning
  - Sweet potato - sliced thinly the width of two fingers put together.
  - Cucumber - cut in spears. the baby will most likely gnaw on the inside and use the skin to hold it
  - Chickpeas - should be rinsed from extra salt if they are from a can and then smashed. Do not serve whole or roasted chickpeas as they present a choking hazard.
  - Cherry tomatoes - if you have large ones then halve them, smaller ones reserve for when they can pincer grasp
Not suitable for pureeing

9 months old+ (or whenever ready for pincer grasp)
- Cut up into bite size pieces or the same as for baby-led weaning

TODDLERS

Serve the same way as for adults for older toddlers and for younger ones smash the canned chickpeas as the harder baked ones might be a choking hazard to them

Picky eaters – serve each ingredient separately so they can choose which they like.

2. You can use dried chickpeas but they need to be presoaked for 12 hours and then cooked for approximately 2 hours. 2 cans of chickpeas would equal about 200 g (7 oz)

Nutrition