I love a warm salad to usher in the Fall season and this one really does it for me! It’s a loaded brussels sprouts salad with creamy maple mustard dressing, a smoky-sweet pecan crumble (my favourite part), crisp apples and a few slices of red onion for good measure. Crunchy caramelized brussels sprout edges plus creamy, sweet, smoky, spiced, and toasted flavours. It’s heaven seriously!
I’ve really been on a hemp seed kick lately, using them for creamy sauces and homemade milks. I purchased some of these hemp hearts from Together Hemp and they are incredible! Super clean, slightly sweet, nutty, and a bit grassy tasting. The flavour is such a huge difference from the ones I was getting before! Also, if you love the maple mustard dressing that I make with them here, you might vibe to my hemp seed ranch dressing in this post as well.
It cooled off so dramatically here over the last week or so. Warm salads and cozy soups feel like the move lately. I still have fully loaded tomato plants in my garden though. This in-between season is so abundant in terms of local availability, can’t help but be grateful and happy about it. Sending you love!
Loaded Brussels Sprouts Salad with Creamy Maple Mustard Dressing and Smoky Pecan Crumble
Ingredients
- ¼ cup pecan halves, toasted
- ½ teaspoon smoked paprika
- ½ teaspoon onion powder
- ½ teaspoon coconut palm or cane sugar
- ¼ teaspoon fennel seeds (optional)
- 3-4 tablespoons olive oil (enough to coat the bottom of your sauté pan)
- 2 garlic cloves, peeled
- 1 ½ lbs brussels sprouts, cut in half lengthwise
- sea salt and ground black pepper, to taste
- ½ cup hulled hemp seeds
- ¼ cup water
- 3 tablespoons apple cider vinegar
- 1 tablespoon maple syrup
- 2 teaspoons dijon mustard
- 1 small apple, chopped (I used a gala apple)
- ½ small red onion sliced
Notes
- This recipe makes extra dressing and nut crumble, which is a great thing! I dressed a kale salad with the leftover dressing and sprinkled the nut crumble over top, and it was seriously heaven.
- If you don’t have an oven-safe sauté pan, you can roast the brussels sprouts on a baking sheet. I would still do the garlic sautéeing step to infuse the oil with the flavour before tossing the sprouts in it, but you can cut the amount of oil back to 1-2 tablespoons if you’re doing the whole cook in the oven.
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 400°F.
- Make the smoky pecan crumble. In a mini food processor, regular food processor, spice grinder, or mortar and pestle, combine the toasted pecan halves, smoked paprika, onion powder, coconut palm sugar, fennel seeds (if using), and big pinches of salt and pepper. Pulse/grind until you have a coarse bread crumb texture. Set aside.
- Set a large, oven-safe sauté pan over medium heat. Once it’s warm, pour in the olive oil and add the garlic cloves to the pan. Sauté the garlic cloves until they are well-browned on all sides, about 3 minutes. Retrieve the garlic cloves from of the pan (leaving the oil behind) and transfer them to an upright blender.
- Add all of the brussels sprouts to the garlic-infused oil in the pan, trying to get the cut side facing down on as many as possible. Sauté and stir the brussels sprouts until golden brown on at least one side, about 5-6 minutes. Season the brussels sprouts with salt and pepper.
- Transfer the pan of brussels sprouts to the oven. Let them roast until tender and deeply golden, about 15-20 minutes.
- While the brussels sprouts are roasting, make the creamy maple mustard dressing. To the upright blender with the garlic cloves, add the hemp seeds, water, apple cider vinegar, maple syrup, dijon mustard, salt, and pepper. Blend this mixture on high until it’s creamy and smooth. Taste the dressing and adjust to your needs (more salt, more vinegar, more maple etc).
- Assemble the salad! Transfer the warm roasted brussels sprouts to your serving plate. Scatter the chopped apple and red onion around. Drizzle some of the dressing over the top and finish with the smoky pecan crumble. Sprinkle a bit of salt and freshly ground black pepper over the top too! Enjoy the loaded brussels sprouts salad immediately
The best recipe I have made this year. Thank you!
This was amazing!!! I added some spice roasted chickpeas for some more protein. We had beautiful brussels sprouts on the vine from the farmers market and the dish tasted like fall. The dressing was delicious and I will definitely be making this again! Thank you for another creative recipe!!!
What the heck! This dressing is AMAZING! I didn’t know what to make for dinner so decided on a classic clean out the fridge roasted veggie, quinoa and spinach bowl and made your dressing to go along with it. We couldn’t get over how tasty the dressing was, my bf even rated the dish 9.6/10 because of the dressing. 9.6! I don’t think he has handed out anything in the 9’s for years. We ate dinner in complete silence and then he gave me a high-five at the end of the meal.
Holy moly…..these were delicious!! Wow! That pecan crumb was so good! I’ve had this recipe bookmarked just waiting for a fall day. And since it’s more like winter, these were the ultimate comfort food! Thank you! This recipe will go on repeat!
I absolutely love this salad! Thank you so much. I’m new to creamy hempseed dressing. There’s no turning back now.
Such a delicious salad that I will be making over and over. The flavour, the texture, mix of roasted veggies and fresh (I threw in cucumbers, garden tomatoes, pickled asparagus) were amazing! Thank you for sharing this recipe.
This dish really is a celebration of fall. I had some beautiful brussels from the farmers market still on the stalks…love the tang of the apple and the pecan crumble was one of the best I’ve ever tasted!!!!! Thanks for another amazing recipe, Laura! You are the queen when it comes to posting delicious recipes and I so appreciate you!!!!
This was so delicious and so creative. The recipe is also really well-written. I’m an experienced cook but man, am I just feeling worn out when it rolls around to dinner time and it’s just so refreshing to be able to follow your recipes (even kind of distracted) and still be able to churn out something great for my family
Wow! This was so delicious! I had gone to the store to get brussel sprouts among other things and got sidetracked and ended up forgetting them. I was disappointed when I realized this but decided to go ahead and just use my head of red cabbage instead. Then I found out I was out of hemp hearts and had to sub in cashews and it still was outstanding! I’ll restock and follow your original recipe but I think I’ll still make it both ways it was that good!
This dressing is DIVINE! I didn’t have Brussels so made the rest with some roasted delicata squash and arugula. Family was licking their plates!