Chocolate Avocado Breakfast Salad

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Happy Friday!!! I can’t believe that NYE is upon us. Time, as they say, flies.

All morning, I did the annoying thing where I excitedly tweeted about an “awesome” recipe and then refused to say what it was. I should make a point of not doing this, because when I do, the pressure to deliver something fabulous is really high. The recipe in question—a chocolate avocado sauce and matching breakfast salad—is really one of the simpler things I’ve made in a while. But I know my readers, and something tells me that you guys love my more simple and sweet recipes. In that spirit, I hope you’ll love what I have to share today.

This recipe is of course a spin on my famous chocomole, which many of you have tried and loved. The avocado and chocolate combination never fails to raise eyebrows, but fortunately it also never fails to win people over. I have made my regular chocomole, my mexican spiced chocomole, and my sweet potato and chocomole for countless friends (including Melissa) and the reviews are always two thumbs way up.

Why, then, not turn this classic raw foodie favorite into a sauce?

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Today, I woke up craving something on the green side. But it was too cold for a green smoothie, and to be honest, I prefer to chew my greens than to puree them. I’ve always enjoyed breakfast salads, but this is the first one I’ve thought to post about. If you guys dig it, it may be the first of many.

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The salad itself is about 4 cups romaine and 1 banana. To be clear, you can use any kind of favorite fruit in this recipe. Banana is my personal favorite, so that’s what I did, but mango and apple would also be great. So would fresh berries! The possibilities are endless. But no matter what you do, don’t forget the chocolate.

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Chocolate Avocado Sauce (raw, vegan, gluten free, soy free)

Makes about 1 1/2 cups

1 small avocado
1/4 cup cocoa powder (I use raw cacao powder from Navitas naturals)
3/4 cup water
1 tbsp almond butter
1/4 cup agave syrup
Dash salt
Stevia to taste
1 tsp vanilla (optional)

Blend all ingredients in a high speed blender till smooth. Add stevia to taste: I prefer making this recipe less sweet, but you should follow your tastebuds. The reason I use a stevia/agave mix is that I find pure stevia to be rather bitter, while all agave can get a little too sugary. Using a mix is a nice way to balance it out, but you can certainly use all of one or the other depending on your needs. Date paste would work well, too!

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Now, breakfasts salads are all well and good, but if you’re like me, you may find that banana+avo+greens is not quite filling enough. For that reason, feel free to add nuts, to serve it with some toast, or to sprinkle it with granola, as I did! Low fat apple cinnamon raisin graw-nola, to be precise:

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That’s fruit, nutrient rich buckwheat, healthy polyunsaturated fats from avocado, and a whole bowl of greens, all before 9 am. Breakfast salads are revolutionary!

Speaking of salad, I had the pleasure of sharing lunch with one of my dearest blogger friends yesterday. JL, whom I met for the first time at Vida Vegan Con, and I met at Pure Food and Wine for a scrumptious raw lunch. It has been so long since I had the pleasure of dining there, and I was so excited!

I began with a “thai greens”—cilantro, pineapple, cucumber, and celery.

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Next came appetizers. The original plan was to split one: the raw nori rolls, which contain jicama rice, avocado, and mirin soaked mushrooms (quite possibly my favorite Pure dish). So that happened.

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But who were JL and I kidding? One appetizer? I think not. A caesar salad was in order, too:

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The Pure caesar is a thing of beauty: delicious raw parm, a tangy, lemony dressing, and crisp nori strips. I love it.

For my entrée, I got a “make your own” salad with beets, carrots, cucumbers, dulse, tomato, avocado, jicama, basil, and the restaurant’s famous rosemary “quackers.” I always feel a little bad ordering salad at Pure, but salad’s my favorite thing, and no one does it better than they do. Finest and most giant salads around. Just look at my mountain:

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JL got a little more creative, and went with the fantastic raw hemp burger:

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You can always count on Pure for fantastic food and exquisite presentation. Sarma, we thank you!!!

JL is truly one of my favorite people: so wise, so whip smart, so generous in every way. She is the embodiment of warmth. I cherish my time with her, and can’t wait for our next hang.

Before I go: thanks for the good feedback yesterday. I’m glad that many of you found the Tara Parker-Pope article interesting. I think it certainly has implications for the ED-recovered: as I’m sure a great many of you have experienced the consequences of metabolic adjustment from weight loss, and if you have, you know that they can feel terribly frustrating, and compound the fear of food, as my friend Elizabeth aptly remarked today. With all of that said, I want to also point out that it is possible for even a temporarily “injured” metabolism to become balanced again: certainly I’m living proof of that. And if you are contemplating necessary weight loss this year (that is, if you need to lose weight for health reasons), you can rest assured that many people do manage to successfully lose enormous amounts of weight, and maintain it. And the vegan and raw communities are particularly full of such stories.

xo

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Categories: Breakfast, Salads
Dietary Preferences: Raw

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    35 Comments
  1. Can’t wait to try this and your newest breakfast salad. Just wondering about servings sizes… You said the sauce makes 1 1/2 cups…did you use the whole 1 1/2 cups on top of the salad?

  2. Eating this as we speak – yum! I did leaf lettuce, orange pepper, pomegranate seeds and pumpkin seeds. I found I needed a bit more water to make the dressing more dressing-y and less pudding-y. And as I was washing the blender I had an idea – I think next time I’m going to make the dressing spicy. Chili chocolate, with chopped mango in the salad? Yum.

  3. One of these days I will make it to Pure Food and Wine! My bf couldn’t help but poke a bit of fun at the way I kept trying to plan our entire new years trip to NYC around a meal at Pure. He kept referring to it as my “pilgrimage.” Luckily, though we were unable to make it down to Pure, we did have a delish meal at Blossom.

  4. Well I’d put all these ingredients in a green smoothie so why not a salad? Plus you get to experience all of the flavors in a new and interesting way.

    And it might even be a way for me to reduce my intake of chocomole while still getting my chocolate fix. Love it 🙂

  5. I’ve been loving green smoothies for breakfast recently as I’ve been having some tummy troubles and they’re easy to digest. When I saw the idea of a breakfast salad on by Kathy at Healthy Happy Life I got excited, but I keep eating all my greens for lunch and dinner by accident! Definitely excited to give this a try. And so jealous of your meetup with JL I would love to meet both of you someday!

  6. This was delicious! Perfect breakfast to ring in the new year. I would love more breakfast salad recipes.

  7. Yum, I love breakfast salads! And this one feels special, like it’s made for breakfast no just left over from last night’s dinner. The granola is a great idea- salad for breakfast tends to make me feel clean and nourished at first then leaves me cranky and hungry in about an hour and a half. Not with this recipe! Happy New Year’s Eve!

  8. Loving your breakfast recipe!

    Just listening to your podcast now and am loving it! So many great points made. I particularly love your reflection on how being a conscious eater does not mean that you’re suffering with an ED or relapsing. I have defo experienced people making such remarks when I’ve been healthy and loving my food, and it’s frustrating. There were so many other great points that resonated with me I can’t begin to list them! Thanks Gena and Our Hen House ladies. Truly enjoyed the podcast x

  9. My first reaction to this post (more precisely, to salad for breakfast) was “never,” but I suppose I should never say never. I swore I’d never drink a green smoothie and I was raw for years before I dared add baby spinach to my beloved vanilla chai-banana concoction, and well, now I’m hooked. I drink three or four green smoothies a week! Anyway, much as I love chocolate, and avocados, and bananas, and salads, and granola, I’m not sure I’m ever going to be combining them.

    I wanted to add, because I didn’t make it clear in my comment on your last post, that I too have managed to reset my metabolism. Even before going raw. Just by feeding my body good nourishing foods three times a day. I think if you stop dieting, eventually your body gets the message that the food’s coming.

    I’d really hate for anyone to read that article and despair of ever being able to lose weight. I’m living proof it’s possible to repair an injured metabolism and to maintain a healthy weight while eating to one’s heart’s content. So much so that I’m given to swear that if there were any truth to the calorie theory I wouldn’t fit through my door. But I’m sure that’s not quite accurate either. 🙂

    I hope if anything that the article inspires people to get off the diet roller coaster and find a way of eating that’s (to use your word) “sustainable.”

  10. This is exactly the kind of recipe/post that made me fall in love with your blog in the first place Gena! Love the idea of a breakfast salad, bananas, raisins and granola would definitely be my go to toppings.

  11. I like this salad idea! I’ve been known to have very green, very savory morning meals but this, oh this is inspired!

    Lunch at Pure Food and Wine was incredible. The food –always delicious– took a serious back seat to the wonderful conversation. I do, however, need to get back for another one of those “burgers” I’m so glad that I ordered new to me items — so many delicious items on the menu that I’ve yet to try!

  12. Love it! Classic Gena, in my oppinion. Simple, elegant and pure. Your dinner at Pure looks amazing too! yay~

  13. omgena! chocolate! breakfast! salad! be still my heart!!! fantastic post. I love the chocolate avocado combination. I love mixing sweet and savory. I love salads for breakfast. But I never once thought about putting avo-choco sauce on a sweet salad!

  14. I am an avid reader of your blog … but I will admit that this is my first comment and it is just to say that I love salads for breakfast and that I am glad I am not the only one! Salads are my favorite Saturday morning breakfast. Strange, yes, but after sleeping in (until 8 a.m.) and a morning workout, a salad is the only thing that sounds good. I usually do a savory salad, but I am going to try your recipe this weekend.

    Thank you for affirming that I am not crazy and for the wonderful recipe!

  15. My mom is in town this week and I think I need to make this breakfast salad just to see the look on her face when I’m eating salad, with chocolate no less, at 8am! Love it. Your food always inspires me.

  16. I am a big fan of veggies in the morning, partly because I’m not a huge fan of fruit (except bananas) and partly because I’m a huge fan of greens. As for the restaurant meals, I have two things to say: 1) I am jealous that you and JL had such a great evening! I am a JL lurker and would love to be a fly on the wall of your conversation, as I can imagine it was enlightening, to say the least and 2) I have never actually seen food that beautiful in my life. Ever.

  17. I love you for continuing to post as you always do, and not turning everything over to new year posting!

    And I love breakfast salad–but this one looks extra special. I love it with a raw yogurt-type sauce too–I used to do that a lot in Hawaii, especially with sweeter greens like romaine or napa cabbage.
    love
    Ela

  18. For some reason, I don’t think I’ve ever thought of salad for breakfast. What a great idea! That looks delicious. I worry about it messing with my blood sugar first thing in the morning though, Maybe some more fat and protein.

    • That’s where the granola came in! It wouldn’t necessarily fill me up on its own, and I may get a little sugar headache without the grain.

  19. This is so funny- I JUST bought chocolate kale chips at Whole Foods today! I was curious, but not very optimistic….but they are amazing!! An unexpected, but delish combo! Can’t wait to try!

  20. Wow, what a post! The restaurant meal looks nice but your at-home creation looks way better!

    I made chocolate covered kale chips, i.e. chocolate coconut cashew sauce and slathered that on the kale, dehyd, etc..and they were so good. Like dessert chips. Anyone who says they don’t like kale just never tried it drowned in coconut oil, cashews, and chocolate 🙂

    Have a great New Years Eve and 2012!
    xo

  21. Hmmm, interesting! Now, maybe this would be a good way for me to get some greens in the morning. I made chocolate avocado mousse for Christmas last week and people loved it! I was so nervous…I loved telling them that avocado was the main ingredient. Glad to see you could fit in another trip to Pure before the year ends!

  22. I know I would love that salad – it has so many of my favourite things. I’ve made a salad with banana and almond butter sauce before but now I have to try this variation. Thanks Gena! You’re making me looking forward to getting back to my own kitchen.

    I’m so glad you and JL got some special time together. You two are such fantastic fun. I really wish I could have been there to enjoy the food and the amazing conversation.

    I hope you enjoy welcoming 2012. May your year be full of love, laughter and a little adventure.

    xoxo

  23. I really love the idea of a breakfast salad! And of course, chocomole is pretty hard to beat. It seems kind of silly that I’ve eaten so many green smoothies in my day, but never a salad for breakfast – gonna have to change that once I get home! Thanks for the awesome idea. 🙂

  24. Just when I think you’ve gone off the deep end, I think, wait, I liked the banana-almond butter-romaine roll-ups, and this is basically just that with chocolate added! Something about the pieces of lettuce cut up still signal savory to me though, but I could probably handle this in wrap format. Although it might be tricky to stick granola in that way.

    What a lovely meal at Pure Food! I will have to get a salad next time I’m there, I find their entree portions a tiny bit too small. Oh wait, I forgot when I was there I had a salad and entree. And dessert. Love that place!