Arugula Salad with Apples and Quinoa

This Arugula Salad with Apples and Quinoa features crisp apple chunks on a bed of arugula and quinoa, topped with cheddar cheese, red onion, candied pepitas, and a creamy honey-mustard dressing. Delicious! 

Looking for your new favorite fall salad? I have totally got you covered with this one. Inspired by the bins of apples crowding my farmers’ market, I created this new salad to highlight their bright flavor. Toss them with some fresh salad greens, like peppery arugula, and add quinoa to make this main course-worthy. Once you’ve got that, you can bring the fun—sharp cheddar cheese and candied pepitas. The pepitas do not take long to make, but add serious attitude to the dish. Top it all off with a honey-mustard dressing, and you’ll be wishing fall would last forever. 

Why Make This Recipe 

• Healthy, but delicious too: This salad is packed with good for you ingredients: fresh greens, apples, and quinoa, but the cheddar cheese and candied pepitas make this a dish you’re absolutely going to crave. 
• Hearty enough for a main course: The addition of quinoa in this dish makes this salad plenty satisfying to eat for lunch or dinner.
• Delicious vegetarian meal: I am trying to reduce the amount of meat I eat and increase my consumption of plant-based and vegetarian meals. This arugula salad with apples has so many goodies packed into it that I am happy to add this to my list of vegetarian favorites. And it’s gluten-free too!

🥗 Ingredients

• Apples: I like to use a semi-tart apple for this dish, like Pink Lady, Gala, or Honey Crisp apples. But you can of course use whatever your favorite snacking apple is! I wouldn’t use apples that are meant only for baking. 
• Quinoa: Feel free to leave out the quinoa if you prefer an arugula-only salad. Still absolutely delicious without it! 
• Cheddar Cheese: A sharp cheddar is the best cheese for this salad—it pairs so beautifully with the apples. Look for “sharp” or “extra-sharp” bricks of cheddar at the grocery store. 1-2 year aged cheddar is the best fit for this dish—if you have cheddar aged over 5 years, it may be too crumbly to cut into chunks for this salad. Or, if you want to try a different cheese option, this arugula salad with apples would be delicious with goat cheese or blue cheese as well. 
• Pepitas: In case you are unfamiliar with this ingredient, pepitas are pumpkin seeds that have had their white outer husks removed. They are high in fat but are packed with nutrients, protein, and fiber, making them a very healthy snack! If you don’t have pepitas, you can substitute candied nuts of any kind (pecans, walnuts, etc.) or even plain (not candied) nuts. 
• Piment d’Espelette: Piment d’Espelette is a French chili pepper, grown mostly in the Basque region of France. It is a fairly mild pepper, but does add a little bit of heat to the chicken in this dish. You can substitute a mild chili powder or paprika (smoked or plain) if you don’t have  piment d’Espelette. 

🥣 Instructions

Begin by making the candied pepitas. Line a sheet pan with parchment paper. Add pepitas to a medium nonstick skillet set to medium-high heat, and toast for 3-5 minutes. Some of the seeds will brown a bit, and you’ll be able to smell a toasty scent. Careful not to burn them—turn down the heat if you smell burning instead of toasting.

Remove pepitas from skillet and set aside. Add sugar, butter, piment d’espelette, and salt to the warm pan. Turn down the heat to medium. Cook sugar and butter mixture until sugar melts and mixture is smooth, stirring frequently. This should take about 5 minutes.

Then quickly stir in pumpkin seeds, using a rubber spatula to try to coat each seed. Then pour seeds onto parchment lined-tray and spread into a single layer using the spatula.

Let cool, then break into chunks with your fingers. While candied pepitas are cooling, prepare the rest of your ingredients. Chop apples into ½-inch chunks, discarding the cores. Chop cheddar cheese into ½-inch chunks. Thinly slice red onion. 

My favorite Healthy Honey Mustard Dressing is super easy to make by just whisking together ½ cup plain greek yogurt, 3 tablespoons honey, 2 tablespoons dijon mustard, and 2 tablespoons olive oil, then seasoning with kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper. You could also try my Healthy Ranch Dressing or my Tahini Yogurt Dressing with this dish!

To assemble salad, toss together arugula, quinoa, apples, cheddar cheese, and red onion in a large bowl. Garnish with candied pepitas, and drizzle with honey mustard dressing. 

🧐 Recipe FAQs

👩‍🍳 Expert Tips

Starting with raw quinoa: There are many methods for cooking quinoa, and instructions often differ from package to package. While I usually recommend going by whatever your package tells you, I tend to ignore the packaged instructions with quinoa. I find that they usually tell you to simmer the quinoa in more water than you need. When quinoa absorbs that extra water, it gets stickier, and you'll find that it clumps easily. See my Quinoa Chickpea Salad with Lemon Vinaigrette recipe to find detailed instructions on how to cook quinoa yourself. 

This salad calls for raw onions, which may have too much of a bite for some people. You can make the onion flavor more mild by soaking your red onion slices in ice water for 15-20 minutes. Then drain and add to your salad!

Other dressing and vinaigrette ideas: This salad is so delicious that you can pair it with all sorts of different kinds of dressings and still enjoy it. One of my favorite options besides this honey mustard dressing is to pair this arugula salad with my Apple Cider Vinegar Salad Dressing. It would also be delicious with my Meyer Lemon Dijon Vinaigrette. You could also just make a simple lemon juice + olive oil dressing and call it a day! Bonus of using a lemon-based dressing is that the lemon juice will help stop the browning of the apples if the salad sits for a while. 

Other Salad and Vegetarian Recipes

If you enjoyed this Arugula Salad with Apples and Quinoa, you may want to check out more quinoa salads recipe, like my Quinoa Avocado Salad with Corn and my Quinoa Grain Bowl with Sesame-Ginger Dressing. My Vegan Buddha Bowl with Lemon Tahini Dressing, my Ramen Egg Rice Bowl, and my Warm Pearl Barley Grain Bowl are other delicious vegetarian grain bowl options.

If you’re looking for other salad recipes that can serve as a main course, you might enjoy one of these hearty and delicious salads:

If you try this recipe, I would love to hear from you! Leave a comment below—I read them all, and your feedback is invaluable to me. And please follow along on Instagram, Pinterest, and Facebook or subscribe to my newsletter. I'd love to inspire you with more delicious, healthy, and seasonal recipes!

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