This post may contain affiliate links. Read my full disclosure policy.
This hearty, Moroccan-inspired, Sweet Potato Salad with kale and chickpeas is full of delicious flavor and incredibly simple and easy to make – with only 20 minutes of actual hands-on time! Make it ahead for midweek lunches, or bring it to your next fall gathering or potluck! Video. Looking for more? check out 25+ Incredible Chickpea Recipes and 40 Must-Try Vegan Salads!
Zen does not confuse spirituality with thinking about God while one is peeling potatoes. Zen spirituality is just to peel the potatoes. ~Alan Watts
Here’s a simple, make-ahead, vegan salad that was inspired by our trip to Morocco last fall. Some of my favorite days there were spent in the spice markets. Wandering down the narrow stone alleyways in the souks, getting wonderfully lost… it was a feast for the senses. I’ll never forget it.
Here, sweet potatoes are diced and roasted, then tossed with fragrant Moroccan spices, chickpeas and lots of fresh herbs. It’s served over a bed of shredded kale for an added burst of nutrients.
Sweet Potato Salad | 45-sec Video
Sweet potato salad Ingredients
- Sweet potatoes (or American yams)
- Cooked or canned chickpeas
- Kale– lacinato is nice!
- Herbs: scallions and cilantro ( or Italian parsley)
- Seasonings: olive oil, apple cider vinegar, maple syrup, orange zest, cumin, coriander, cinnamon, cayenne, salt and pepper
How to make Sweet Potato Salad
Toss small cubes of sweet potatoes with olive oil, salt, and spices and roast until tender and crispy. Sweet potatoes, when roasted, are lovely in fall salads, keeping their shape well. Plus, they only take 15-20 minutes in the oven! And they are loaded with powerful antioxidants. And have I told you how much I love them? I do, I seriously do. And I feel like they love me back. It’s not my imagination. 😉
Create lacinato kale ribbons: remove any tough veins, stack 5–6 leaves, and finely slice across the grain into thin ribbons to create a “slaw.” Drizzle lightly with olive oil, sprinkle a pinch of salt, and massage the oil into the kale ribbons with your fingers until the kale ribbons become tender and glossy. For an extra lovely touch, add 1–2 teaspoons of orange zest and massage this in too.
Place the dressed shredded kale in a serving bowl.
Place the chickpeas, scallions, cilantro, olive oil, vinegar, maple, orange zest, cumin, cinnamon, and cayenne in a medium bowl and toss to combine. Sorry, I forgot to photograph this in my haste. 🙂
When the sweet potatoes are tender, let them cool for 10 minutes, add to the chickpea bowl and season the salad with salt and pepper to taste.
Serve this over massaged lacinato kale ribbons.
This salad will keep 3-4 days in the fridge.
The Moroccan Spices complement all the other ingredients well!
Hope you enjoy this roasted Sweet Potato Salad! Healthy, vegan and gluten-free, it is so EASY to make! I know you’ll love the flavors!
On the homefront: I’ve said it a million times. This is my favorite time of year. I love the breezy cool sunny days of early fall in the Northwest. The light shifts, the relaxed angle of the sun softens the hard edges of summer and I feel this sweet gentleness hover over me when I’m outside. I can’t get enough of it!
Ok- enjoy the salad, and have a great day!
xoxo
More recipes you may like!
- Our Favorite Chickpea Salad
- Favorite Quinoa Salad with Chickpeas!
- Sweet Potato Fries with Harissa!
- Mashed Sweet Potatoes with Ginger
- Maple-Roasted Sweet Potatoes
- Moroccan Stuffed Sweet Potatoes
- Thai Sweet Potato Soup
- BBQ Stuffed Sweet Potatoes
- Oaxacan Baked Sweet Potatoes
- Kyoto Style Sweet Potatoes with Miso, Ginger and Scallions
Sweet Potato Salad
- Prep Time: 20
- Cook Time: 25
- Total Time: 45 minutes
- Yield: 6 ½ cups 1x
- Category: main, vega, salad
- Method: baked
- Cuisine: moroccan
- Diet: Vegan
Description
This hearty, Moroccan-inspired, Sweet Potato Salad with kale and chickpeas is full of delicious flavor and incredibly simple and easy to make – with only 20 minutes of actual hands-on time! Make it ahead for midweek lunches, or bring it to your next fall gathering or potluck!
Ingredients
- 2 sweet potatoes or American yams, diced into 1/2-inch cubes, skins OK (about 4 cups)
- 1 tablespoon olive oil
- 1 teaspoon smoked paprika
- generous pinch salt and pepper
- 14 ounce can of chickpeas, rinsed and drained (about 1 1/2 cups cooked chickpeas)
- 2–3 scallions, sliced at a diagonal
- 1 bunch cilantro, chopped, about 3/4 cup (or sub Italian Parsley)
- 3 tablespoons olive oil
- 3 tablespoons apple cider vinegar
- 1 tablespoon maple syrup (or honey)
- 1 tablespoon orange zest
- 1 teaspoon cumin
- 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
- 1/2 teaspoon cayenne or Aleppo chili flakes
- salt and pepper to taste
- 5–6 lacinato kale leaves, thick bottom stem removed.
Instructions
Preheat oven to 425°F
Place the diced yams on a parchment lined baking sheet, drizzle with olive oil, and sprinkle with smoked paprika, salt, and pepper. Toss to coat well. Spread the yams out so they have lots of space to crisp. Place in the oven and roast 15 minutes, toss, and continue roasting until tender and slightly crispy, about 10 more minutes. You don’t want them overly soft.
Meanwhile, place the chickpeas, scallions, cilantro, olive oil, vinegar, maple, orange zest, cumin, cinnamon, and cayenne in a medium bowl and toss to combine.
To create the lacinato kale ribbons, remove any tough veins, stack 5–6 leaves, and finely slice across the grain into thin ribbons to create a “slaw.” Drizzle lightly with olive oil, sprinkle a pinch of salt, and massage the oil into the kale ribbons with your fingers until the kale ribbons become tender and glossy. For an extra lovely touch, add 1–2 teaspoons orange zest and massage this in too.
When the sweet potatoes are tender, let them cool for 10 minutes, then add to the bowl and season the salad with salt and pepper to taste.
Serve this over massaged lacinato kale ribbons.
Salad will keep 3-4 days in the fridge (keep the kale slaw separate).
Notes
Nutrition
- Serving Size: 1 1/2 cups
- Calories: 360
- Sugar: 9.2 g
- Sodium: 684.6 mg
- Fat: 16.6 g
- Saturated Fat: 2.3 g
- Carbohydrates: 47.5 g
- Fiber: 9.9 g
- Protein: 8.4 g
- Cholesterol: 0 mg
Keywords: sweet potato salad, sweet potato salad recipe, moroccan sweet potato salad, roasted sweet potato salad, moroccan chickpea salad, moroccan chickpea salad, sweet potato salad, sweet potato salad recipes, roasted sweet potato salad, moroccan sweet potato salad, best sweet potato salad, vegan sweet potato salad
Fabulous! The kale so tender that I’d welcome more of it next time. I julienned it very small & added lemon zest as I had no more orange zest. It was yummy. Very filling, pretty, perfectly balanced tasting dish. Thank you ever so much for sharing the recipe with readers. Aleppo pepper was fruity and not harsh so I’d recommend it if available.
★★★★★
Awesome to hear Tracy- and thanks for the note on the kale!
Amazing flavors!!! Never tasted Moroccan flavors before… I’m addicted. Thank-you. I love your food..just haven’t posted my raves before!
★★★★★
Thanks Kathy! So happy you enjoyed this!
Delicious, healthy, easy! Three qualities that make a winning combo!
★★★★★
Thanks Leslie!
This was a great recipe. My family really liked the spices and orange zest.
Definitely follow the kale directions. Thin slivers of kale make all the difference.
★★★★★
Great to hear Christopher!
Absolutely delicious! I did not have the lemon. I’ve made twice. The first time made a big mess in the oven from the oil dripping off the cookie sheet. The second time I used a deeper baking sheet and did not roast the kale or the chickpeas. I decided to hear the chickpea mixture with the kale in the microwave and added the roasted sweet potatoes afterwards and the meal was phenomenal!!!
Perfect Lana, sorry about the messy oven the first time around. 😉
Delicious salad, I didn’t have sweet potato so used beetroot still worked well
Thank you for all your super recipes
★★★★★
Nice Jacqui, glad you enjoyed!
I make this salad all the time and honestly it’s always crazy good!
★★★★★
Thanks Alex!
Can i substitute regular green kale?
★★★★★
Yes, but make sure to massage until tender. 🙂
A great recipe but I’m confused why the ingredients lists yams instead of sweet potatoes. Yams are a completely different vegetable.
Yams are a type of sweet potato. 🙂
Looking forward to making this recipe. Just to clear up any confusion, yams and sweet potatoes taste similar but are botanically different plants . See the quote below from the Mississippi State Cooperative Extension Service:
They are also botanically different. Sweet potatoes belong to the morning glory family of plants, called the Convolvulaceae family. Yams belong to a different family, called Dioscoreaceae. The edible parts of sweet potatoes are called roots, and yams are classified as tubers. Sweet potato plants are more prolific, producing 4-10 roots per plant. Yams produce just 1-5 tubers per plant.
You won’t find many true yams in U.S. grocery stores because they require specific growing conditions found in the Caribbean
A wonderful light meal. Don’t skip the orange zest, it adds a lot of flavor!
★★★★★
Thanks Susie!
One of our favorites (ok we have many favorites)! When I can get my hands on purple sweet potatoes I use a mix of yellow and purple and the dish comes out gorgeous. And I just throw in the orange slices too after zesting them. I sometimes char the kale in oven when we don’t feel like eating completely raw. 25 min @ 425 for the chickpeas are perfect for them to come out crunchy.
★★★★★
So pretty! Sounds amazing Bowie!
Oh my goodness…this is the bomb….love this salad so much. I added fresh pomegranate when I took it to a party…the colour was sensational and the juicy burst was bliss on a hot summers night..
★★★★★
Love the addition of pomegranate! Brilliant! And very Moroccan. 🙂
Lovely, as are all the recipes I have tried from this site. It’s the depths of winter here so I adapted it slightly to make it a warm side dish- roasting the canned chickpeas sprinkled with some olive oil and cumin alongside the sweet potato. The Cavolo nero (I use in place of Lacinto Kale) is quite leathery so I steam/stir fried ribbons of it a bit to soften it up. It worked well as a warm side dish – I’m vegan but my husband is a carnivore so he had some Cod sprinkled with ras el hanout and preserved lemon baked at the same time as the sweet potato. Served it with some harissa paste on the side.
★★★★★
Caro- Love how you adapted t make this warm!
Made this for a Potluck, was absolutely a hit! Delicious
★★★★★
My husband and I loved this recipe and it was satisfying enough for a vegetarian main course with a bit of fruit and some vegetables on the side. I made the cilantro / honey / Aleppo pepper version.
As for the website, I typically use an iPad and I have issues with ads and the page spontaneously reloading, requiring me to scroll back down to where I left off. I’ve tried using Reader View to get around it, but for some reason that eliminates the ingredient list. Sometimes I’ll just hit the Print button on the recipe, which brings it up in another tab in Safari without ads. Other times, I’ll just print it out as I enjoy cooking without scrolling. 🙂 The recipes are so good, that I’m okay with finding workarounds!
★★★★★
Sorry about that Sherie. Whenever there are updates to the website, which seem to be happening daily lately- it kicks people off and reloads. I will experiment with the site on my iPad so I can see what you are dealing with.
I’m OBSESSED with this salad. I’ve made it a few times, and I do prefer cilantro over parsley, and I use maple syrup, not honey. I’ve subbed lemon zest for the orange zest as well when I didn’t have an orange, and it was so good still! I do like to squeeze some fresh lemon juice on it as well. I’ve eaten it on top of a salad and do prefer it on its own as a side. 10/10 recommend!
★★★★★
Thanks Katie! So happy you are enjoying this!
Hi Tom- I hear you and you are right, and yes, I know the ads are annoying. I will see where we can cut them back. There is a skip to recipe button at the top of each post that will help mitigate the ads. Can I ask, what are you on? phone, tablet or desktop? Just curious.
Hi! I just made this today and it was spectacular. I just wanted to say that I used my phone and computer for this recipe and the ads were not an issue at all…. So maybe there’s another problem on their end. Anyway, hope to see more vegan and vegetarian stuff!
★★★★★
Oh thank you, Jillian! Appreciate the feedback and am glad you liked the salad.
I do see Tom’s point. The pop-up ads AND pop-up prep videos are a distraction from your wonderful recipes & info. Thanks for ‘skip to recipe’. I’m on an iPhone. Love your site! suggestion.
Made this recipe last night and loved it! I had some fresh mint leftover from another recipe that needed a home soon and I thought that would fit the Moroccan profile so I added that, too. Eating leftovers today in a Buddha bowl! Thank you for the constant inspiration!
★★★★★
I have been looking for new ways to eat chickpeas! Thanks so much. This was easy and tasty!! They say to eat chickpeas at least once a week! So now I have more ideas:)
★★★★★
Loving all of your vegan recipes! Thanks! Vegan January may go into Feb…
★★★★★
Omg if you have doubt about this recipe forget them. This was the best surprise ever. I’ll love this dish!
★★★★★
I’ve made this recipe multiple times for my husband and I and for guests who loved it too! The flavors are so great together and it’s full of healthy ingredients! It’s filling and can be a meal in itself.
★★★★★
This look delicious! Perfect for a winter day. Can’t wait to try it. Ordering groceries now!
★★★★★
This looks delicious! I can’t wait to try it! I have loved everything I have made of yours:).
Nice post. I was checking constantly this blog and I’m impressed!
★★★★★
A favorite with my husband. It keeps in the fridge for snacking.
★★★★★