Mushroom Lentil Salad and the Best Dressing

Mushroom Lentil Salad with Mustardy Miso Dressing is the spicy, salty, tangy dish you will not be able to stop making and eating. With only a few ingredients, this recipe is too simple and quick! Shall we?

Jump to:

• What is Mushroom Lentil Salad?
• What Ingredients You Need for Mushroom Lentil Salad
• What are the Best Mushrooms for Salad?
• What Kind of Lentils Are Best for Salad?
• Pro Tips, Tricks, and Techniques
• Ingredients Substitutions
• Best Dressings for Mushroom Lentil Salad
• Mushroom Lentil Salad Recipe

What is Mushroom Lentil Salad?

This Mushroom Lentil Salad is the perfect five-flavor combination of umami mushrooms, protein- and fiber-rich lentils, bitter arugula, and a subtly spicy, salty, sweet and supremely flavorful dressing.

Eat Mushroom Lentil Salad as you would any other super flavorful salad or slaw. It also works as a light, vegetarian main dish salad, or an even heartier dish if you toss in some quinoa, tofu, or shredded chicken.

Is Mushroom Lentil Salad Healthy?

Depending on your health needs and dietary considerations, Mushroom Lentil Salad is healthy! To be honest, I can't really think of a case in which the Mushroom Lentil Salad would not be healthy, unless maybe spice or acid from vinegar causes heartburn or other gastric issue for you.

Let's break down some of the nutritional highlights, starting with the most underrated nutrition hero, mushrooms. Mushrooms not only add some crazy ass umami to a dish, but they are especially good for the body in the fall and winter months when our bodies don't get as much sun to produce vitamin D. Some varieties of mushrooms provide vitamin D. Mushrooms are also:

• are anti-inflammatory
• contain fiber in both soluble and insoluble forms including beta-glucans, which all support good gut health, decrease cholesterol, and lower blood sugar
• provide all of the essential amino acids to be considered a good, complete protein

Dietary Considerations of Mushroom Lentil Salad

As published, this recipe for Mushroom Lentil Salad is:

• 100% plant-based, suitable for vegans if you don't use the optional parmesan cheese
• vegetarian
• dairy-free
• gluten-free/wheat-free
• grain-free
• refined sugar-free
• anti-inflammatory

What Ingredients You Need for Mushroom Lentil Salad

If you've spent some time around here and made some of the recipes, then you more than likely already have the pantry ingredients. If not, they're some of the easier ones to find at the grocery store.

Mushroom Lentil Salad ingredients:

• mushrooms, 12-16 ounces any mix
• lentils, 2 cups cooked
• arugula, 6 cups
• red onion, ¼ thinly sliced and soaked in ice water for 10 minutes

Miso Mustard Dressing for Mushroom Lentil Salad:

• miso, 4 tablespoons
• Dijon mustard, 2 tablespoons
• garlic, 1 clove finely minced
• maple syrup, 1 tablespoon
• apple cider vinegar, ¼ cup
• olive oil, ¼ cup

What are the Best Mushrooms for Salad?

In this recipe, I use shiitake, oyster, and cremini mushrooms.

Though any kind of mushrooms, or mixture of mushrooms, will work in Mushroom Lentil Salad, my preference is for varieties commonly associated with Asian cooking like shiitake mushrooms, oyster, eryngii (king oyster), and maitake (hen of the woods). These are all pictured above.

Want your mind-blown? Cremini mushrooms may sound fancy, but they are indeed just brown mushrooms, and sometimes they're called "baby bella" mushrooms because they are, in fact, actually baby portobello mushrooms! Yes, brown, cremini, baby bella and those enormous portobello mushrooms are all the same mushrooms, just at different points in their growth!

What Kind of Lentils Are Best for Salad?

tl;dr. For this salad, my preference is for brown lentils because they retain their shape when cooked, are easiest to find at most grocery stores, cook very quickly, and are affordable.

Lentils are edible seeds in the legume family which also includes beans and peas. There are quite a few different types and they all vary in appearance, as well as in nutrition profile. These are the most common:

• Brown lentils, which range in brown hues from grayish to green, have an earthy flavor and retain their shape when cooked, which makes them ideal for dishes like salad and soups in which you want the lentils to stay firm. Brown lentils are easy to find in grocery stores and are generally the most affordable.
• Green lentils are, you guessed it, green, though they sometimes veer slightly into a light greenish brown hue. They have a slightly more pronounced earthy, nutty, sometimes slightly peppery flavor. Like brown lentils, green lentils stay firm when cooked, though they do require slightly longer prep and cooking time. Green lentils are good in salads and other dishes where lentils are the primary ingredient like lentil soup.
• Puy Lentils are a type of green lentil from Puy, France, so sometimes they are called Lentils du Puy. They are smaller than regular green lentils and have a more pronounced flavor.
• Red lentils which range in color from dark yellow to reddish-orange, are actually brown or green lentils that have been hulled and split into their halves, which means they cook much faster than other lentils—20 minutes vs 35-40 minutes—and break down when completely cooked through. Because they break down, red lentils are best for curries, dals, and thick, puree-type soups.
• Black lentils are small, and slightly more rounded than other lentils. They look like caviar, so black lentils are sometimes called Beluga lentils. They're not as common as other lentils and usually cost a little more. They are sturdy, retain their shaped when cooked, and have a stronger flavor. Black lentils are good in salads, soups, and any dish where they are the star ingredient.

Dressing Ingredients Notes and Resources

Miso: Use any light-colored white or yellow miso that is labeled "organic" or "non-gmo." My favorite brands are all organic—this brand, this brand (pictured above), and this brand—and I have been able to find them in Whole Foods Markets in southern California.

Dijon Mustard. This Dijon mustard brand has never failed me. The mustard adds some degree of flavor, but more importantly, emulsifies the rest of the ingredients into one homogenous mixture.

Apple Cider Vinegar. Any brand of apple cider vinegar "ACV" works as long as it has the "mother," i.e. the little cloud floating inside. The mother is what causes the fermentation and is partially what makes this salad good for the gut. This generic store brand of organic Apple Cider Vinegar is generally the most affordable where I shop. This is the well-known apple cider vinegar brand that's available everywhere. You can substitute up to half the apple cider vinegar with fresh lemon juice for additional layer of flavor and sweetness.

Olive Oil. Use the highest quality extra virgin olive oil you can afford, preferably with a recent Harvest Date on the bottle, not just the Expiration Date. I used a limited production boutique brand of organic California olive oil for this recipe. This is a more widely available high quality olive oil that I use for every day cooking.

Onions, garlic, and all other fresh herbs and produce from either the Santa Monica Farmers' Market on Wednesday, or Whole Foods Market.

Pro Tips, Tricks, and Techniques

Pre-cooked lentils will save you at least 35 minutes of cooking time, sometimes more depending on the type of lentils. You can find vacuum-packed pre-cooked lentils in the refrigerated produce section, and sometimes even canned!

Double or triple the quantity cooked of lentils, or any grain or legume for that matter, if you cook from scratch!

Cook lentils in bone broth to amp the flavor and an added nutrition boost!

Double, triple, or even quadruple the Miso Mustard Dressing. The amount of ingredients for Miso Mustard Dressing makes about 1 cup, which fits this specific recipe. But I highly recommend scaling up to make triple the amount of the dressing! Use the amount you need for the salad, then store the rest in an airtight glass jar in the refrigerator. The sauce is great as an all-purpose spicy dressing over greens, grains, or even dip for fresh vegetables! Add some chopped scallions for some color and an extra layer of flavor.

Ingredients Substitutions

If you have trouble finding any of the ingredients for this recipe, here are some suggested substitutions and variations:

• Other leafy green for arugula. If you find that arugula has a little too much of a peppery bite for you, substitute in an equivalent amount of literally any other green. Finely shredded Tuscan kale, the kind that looks like long, dark forest green bumpy leaves, or even shredded Brussels sprouts are great stand-ins from the same family, the Brassicas. For the mildest flavor that still packs a nutritional punch, try baby spinach.
• Other vinegar for Apple Cider Vinegar. If you don't have apple cider vinegar, use any vinegar like rice vinegar or white wine vinegar. You can even use lemon or lime juice, though you may have to increase the amount to get the same level of acidity. If you only have plain distilled vinegar, which is much sharper than the others, cut the intensity by using only half the amount and adding half lemon juice.

What else to add for a Fun Variation?

• Quinoa or other sturdy grain, about 1 cup cooked, will make this a heartier dish! I generally use red quinoa, as each grain maintains the integrity of its shape and can stand up to being tossed with other ingredients, including vinaigrettes and dressings. However, I didn't have any red quinoa on hand so I used white organic quinoa and it was perfect.
• Pickled onions on hand, like I always do? Use them in place of the sliced fresh red onions!
• Roasted nuts like almonds, pistachios, or walnuts, for a protein and/or omega-3 boost

Best Dressings for Mushroom Lentil Salad

Though the Miso Mustard Dressing included with the recipe is my personal favorite for Mushroom Lentil Salad—and pretty much every salad—that doesn't mean there aren't other dressings that work for different moods and still balance the flavors of the salad. From a lighter brighter Apple Cider Vinaigrette to a sweet and spicy Hot Honey Balsamic, try a few of the below:

Advance Prep, Leftovers, and Storage

Advance Prep

You can prep everything for Mushroom Lentil Salad up to three days in advance then toss together with dressing just before serving.

Leftovers

Store any leftover Mushroom Lentil Salad that has already been mixed with dressing in an air-tight container in the refrigerator for up to 1 day, though the arugula will wilt significantly, but they will be fine to eat.

Freezing

Mushroom Lentil Salad recipe does not freeze.

Tools and Equipment

There isn't any special tool or piece of equipment that is absolutely required for this Mushroom Lentil Salad. You can make it using a sharp chef's knife on a sturdy cutting board to slice the mushrooms and red onions! However, that isn't to say there are a few tools that might make it slightly easier to get the Mushroom Lentil Salad from the farmers market to your fork (or chopsticks), namely a mandoline or slicing attachment on your food processor!

• Japanese mandoline, for faster uniform slicing
• regular mandoline with storage container
• Chef's knife, my personal workhorse
• Wooden cutting board, oversized
• Glass mixing bowls 
• Mini ¼-cup liquid measuring cup
• Mini whisk
• Glass storage container with airtight lids, perfect size for storing prepped cabbage and carrots you make it in advance
• Glass mason jars, wide mouth because they're easier to use and wash
• Mason jar lids that are better than those horrible 2-piece metal lids

What to Make with Lentils

Food for Afterthoughts

This article in the Village Voice about words it hates and this post on epicurious about food cliches set off an obsession, turning what was once this bloggy list of ten words into an exercise in "wordspotting." I love collecting little rain droplets of haterade, so please do leave your (un)favorites in the comments, then go over to the Delicious Dictionary to make suggestions for the better.

Let’s discuss the art of writing, shall we? More specifically, let’s talk about writing a food blog. If you’re getting all fussy about the details of the syllabus, then the lecture topic for today is vocabulary, and if we’re going to drill right down to the core, we’re going to list words you should never use when writing on your food blog.

No, they include neither "cinnamon" nor "nutmeg." "Vanilla," however…

don’t skip ahead!

** note ** If your food blog consists only of pictures and recipes in standard listed, numbered format, ignore me. I’ll ignore you too, because that’s boring.

I'm Not a Writer. I Just Play One on My Blog

I have absolutely no business writing a post about how to write a food blog, or how to be a good food writer, or how to write at all, for that matter. No education, certification, formal training, or experience in anything remotely related to writing or to food, I was an economics major in college. Not the intellectualization for Domestic Goddess, home economics, but the widget-producing, consumer surplus-ing, policy arguing economics economics. I crunched numbers and played with models, and they weren’t even the pretty, dumb ones that I could “tutor.” In grad school, I only learned how to edit “I’m the best of breed in this 800-pound gorilla so you should monetize the ground I hit running before I paradigm shift my high-ROI value propositions to another category killer that won’t take my bandwidth offline” to just…"MBA." (I wanted to, but just couldn’t, work “synergy” in there.)

As far as professional writing experience, I have none. My first real job was consulting wherein the only writing I did was bulletized onto whiteboards so I could be in ur powerz, pointing ur pointz! Currently, I’m in marketing, and as you know, marketers make up words expressly because they can’t write. Let’s do some namestorming, ‘k? And food? I didn’t cooooome (close)…to Chan Dara.

Wow. If ever I actually did want to pursue a career in food writing, I should totally use this post as my resume!

Eating and Reading—More than Just a Rhyme

If anything at all, I am a fabulously talented food reader, and these are my thoughts from that perspective.

If you cook, then you know that one of a cook’s ultimate goals is to produce a dish or meal that is at once flavorful, colorful, creative, and accurately expresses whatever emotion or experience the cook was trying to achieve through food.

A food writer is like a cook. Words are the ingredients and the final result should be something just as colorful, vibrant, flavorful and creative as a gurgling blue cheese-blanketed blood red filet that weeps its rare grilled history onto the plate or a pristine piece of poached halibut lying anxiously like a virgin on a bed of pureed fava beans. (Ew. Yes, that was trying a little too hard.) Even with the most mundane of ingredients like tomatoes, basil and cheese, cooks look for the freshest, the brightest, the ones that will have the most impact on the plate. The cook wants to re-create an experience with food, and so too should someone writing about food pick words to re-create the experience in a reader’s mind. It’s not enough for a cook to present just a tomato, and it’s not enough for a writer to say “good.”

Given that I will probably be excommunicated from the food blogosphere for such an audacious post, such flagrant intellectual arrogance, as if I were some celebrated food blogger who has the authority to write on such matters, I’m…totally going to get started!

Top 10 Words You Should Avoid in Your Writing as a Food Blogger

(Because They're Too "Vanilla")

1. good

This is just about the most generic word, food-related or otherwise, ever penned by man. Good? Good could mean it was outstanding, it could mean it was average, or it could mean you didn’t develop dysentery. If “good” is all you have in your arsenal of words, at the very least, use its comparative form “better” against something that was not as good. For example, don’t say “The coffee at Aroma Coffee and Tea Co. was good.” So the fuck what? At least say, “The coffee at Aroma Coffee and Tea Co. was better than Starbucks.” Just make sure they weren’t serving Starbucks.

2. bad

If you’re going to throw out “good,” then go ahead and handcuff it to its opposite, “bad” before you hurl them both into the toilet. Bad is not only a generic negative term that could mean everything from slightly flawed to “may cause death or disfigurement,” but it has the added problem of having a positive connotation in an urban context. Just ask MJ. He’s bad, and in this case, we’re not talking about his cosmetic surgery gone awry. And don’t ever let me catch you writing “not good” to replace bad.

3. best

Good is bad, better is better and the superlative form “best” is just nonsense, if that makes sense. There is no such thing as “the best” anything. Is it – whatever “it” is – really the best, as compared to say, Martha Stewart’s? Of course not, because Martha Stewart is the best, duh. I don’t care if your mother makes “the best” lasagne. Says who? You? You’re fickle. Tomorrow, of course your mother-in-law makes it better, and then what? What’s better than the best? Nothing! “Best” by itself to describe a thing is stupid because it doesn’t describe anything in detail. How is it the best? Is it the best looking? Best tasting? Don’t use “best” unless you add some qualifiers.

4. flavorful

Everything you put in your mouth is flavorful if you can taste it. Hell, even water is flavorful. Mine is full of the flavor of Clorox boiled in a cast iron skillet.

5. bland

The pasta was bland. Gee, really? You mean the kitchen went against every thing they’ve ever learned in cooking school and decided to serve it without a trace of sauce? In fact, they made the pasta themselves? Out of air? Wow, I guess it was bland. If it wasn’t salty enough, say “it wasn’t salty enough.” If it tasted like chicken broth straight out of can, say “it tasted like chicken broth straight out of the can.”

6. tasty

Tasty is the same as “tastes good.” See number 1, and try again.

7. delicious

This is my word. I made it up. I don’t care what Merriam, Webster, or any other etymologist says about chocolate covered
crickets. Don’t use “delicious.” It’s mine.

8. spicy

You can’t use this word without at least explaining whether it was spicy with respect to spices like cinnamon and nutmeg, or spicy in terms of heat like registering so high on the Scoville Richterometer that you had firrhea for three days. They are different. You can’t just say “the coffee cake was spicy” because you could have made it with Tapatio and no one would know. P.S. Cholula is so much better than Tapatio.

9. juicy

This is a powder blue terry cloth track suit, not a descriptive word that should be used to describe fruit, steak, or eggs. In either case, fashion or food, give it to Goodwill.

10. mouth-watering

If it makes your mouth water, you’re one of Pavlov’s dogs. Try again.

Unlearn these words. Today. Use a thesaurus. It won't bite.

Oh, and by the way, while we’re talking about the finer points of effective food writing, you should never, ever try to weave a story about a salad into some pathetic post about blogging on your food blog. I mean, look at how unsuccessful I have been in my attempt to associate a list of too-generic food words with Mushroom Lentil Salad

First of all, there is absolutely nothing generic about Mushroom Lentil Salad. Secondly, the fact that you can linger over delicious salad that you’ve flavorfully flavored with spicy ingredients like mustard and arugula, and enjoy tasty mushrooms.

P.S. By writing this post, I am in no way implying that I am a good writer, nor am I claiming that I have never used these words before. You know what they always say. Those who can't do, write on a blog.