Green Goddess Veggie Bowls
Meet your new go-to lunch! I’ve been craving more veggies lately and these green goddess veggie bowls are my new favorite. They’re simple, incredibly flavorful, customizable and packed with healthy fats (EVOO + avocado) + tons of greens. Basically, I’m saying that they’ll become a staple for your lunch line-up (especially if you’ve been going a litttttle overboard on all the carbs, alcohol, etc like me!).
The recipe makes about 2 cups of dressing, so I like to store any leftovers in the fridge for bowls, salads or even a dip for fresh veggies throughout the week.
Makes ~1.5 cups dressing
INGREDIENTS
For the Green Goddess dressing:
Kosher salt, to taste
1 egg yolk
1/2 cup avocado oil (or any neutral oil, i.e. grapeseed
1.5 cups loosely packed parsley leaves
1/2 cup loosely packed basil leaves
2 Tbsp loosely packed tarragon
1 clove garlic, grated on a microplane
1 avocado
3/4 cup extra virgin olive oil
Juice from 1 lemon
2.5 Tbsp champagne vinegar
For the bowls (you can customize and mix + match; these are some ideas)
Base: romaine lettuce, little gems, kale, rice, your favorite grain
Blanched/grilled/roasted vegetables: asparagus, zucchini, broccoli, baby broccoli, cauliflower, sweet potato
Fresh vegetables: cucumbers, radish, red bell pepper
Other fun additions: soft or hard boiled egg, pickled red onions, micro greens, fresh basil leaves, pepitas, nuts of choice
METHOD
In the bowl of a stand mixer (can also use a hand mixer, or whisk by hand), add the egg yolk and a pinch of salt. Whisk to combine.
Very slowly, drip (literally add droplets at a time) the avocado oil into the yolk with the mixer on medium speed or whisking vigorously if doing by hand. See notes below for explanation on why you want to add the oil very slowly. Once you have added about 2 Tbsp of the oil, you can start to stream in the remaining oil a little quicker but still in a slow stream to prevent breaking. Using one of these to add the oil helps!
Once all of the oil has been added, whisk in the lemon juice. This will thin out the mixture, which is pretty thick at this point. Let the aioli sit while you make the herb + avocado mixture.
Blend the parsley, basil, taragon, garlic, the whole avocado and the extra virgin olive oil in a blender until the mixture is smooth and homogeneous.
Time to add the herb oil into the aioli base. Turn the mixer back on to medium speed and gradually whisk in the herb + avocado mixture until all of it has been incorporated.
Whisk in the champagne vinegar until just until combined. Add kosher salt, to taste. Since we haven’t really seasoned the dressing much at this point, you will likely need to add a fair amount of salt.
Now comes the fun part – assembling! If you’re using some sort of green as your base, toss them to coat with the dressing. If you’re using rice or grains as your base, add them to the bowl undressed. Top your base with your blanched/grilled/roasted veggies of choice and drizzle with some dressing (use less if you have dressed greens as your base and more if you have undressed rice/grains as your base). Top with fresh vegetables + any other fun additions and enjoy!
NOTES
This dressing is on the thicker side, so it might drown out a more delicate lettuce like arugula or a spinach but you can definitely use those as your base if you want!
The base of this dressing is like an aioli. It’s basically an emulsification of egg yolk and oil and the result is a super creamy end-product. It’s made into a green goddess with the addition of herbs to some of that oil and also the avocado. I made mention of this in the recipe, but when you first start adding oil to the egg yolks, it’s really important to SLOWLY drip in the oil while constantly whisking (or with your mixer/food processor turned on). This slowly introduces the oil to the yolk (the two don’t normally jive) and creates a creamy base for the dressing. Adding the oil quickly will result in a “broken” mixture, which is really just when you can see streaks of oil in the yolk since it has essentially separated (again, normally oil and egg yolks aren’t friends). Once you’ve created a strong emulsion (after adding about 2 Tbsp of the oil), you can stream in the remaining oil a little faster with less risk of breaking the dressing. If you’re mixing by hand, you can totally take breaks throughout the process (I did this by hand and trust me, you’ll need it!). Adding lemon juice will not break the mixture. It will just help it thin out! Hit me up with any aioli/green goddess dressing questions here or on Instagram too!