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How to eat meatless at lunch? Here are the best healthy vegetarian lunch ideas that will keep you satisfied all afternoon!

Chickpea salad sandwich | Vegetarian chicken salad sandwich | Easy lunch recipes

Lunch is one of the hardest times of the day to eat healthy, right? In the middle of a crazy day, the last thing you want to think about when your stomach is rumbling is clean eating! But Alex and I have found with just a little bit of planning, lunch time can be manageable! Here are a few of the real life recipes that we eat for lunch.

More lunch inspiration? Go to 40 Easy Healthy Lunch Ideas, Vegan Lunch Ideas or Gluten Free Lunch Ideas.

And now: our our favorite vegetarian lunch ideas!

Notes on vegetarian lunch ideas

These vegetarian lunch ideas are ultra simple. Honestly, we’d rather spend our main cooking energy on healthy dinner recipes. These vegetarian lunch ideas include sandwiches, snacks, and dips you can mix and match to form a meal. A few notes on protein:

  • It’s important to make sure your lunch has enough plant-based protein so you stay full! Here’s more about how to get protein as a vegetarian.
  • Add in protein sides to keep you full all day. Some lunch ideas stand alone, like our Chickpea Salad Sandwich. But others are things you could combine to make a meal: for example, hummus, crackers, a hardboiled egg and an apple. Most of our vegetarian lunch recipes are simple to put together day of, or easy to make a big batch of and eat off of during the week.
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Chickpea salad sandwich | Vegetarian chicken salad sandwich | Easy lunch recipes

30 Vegetarian Lunch Ideas


  • Author: Sonja Overhiser
  • Prep Time: 10 minutes
  • Cook Time: 0 minutes
  • Total Time: 10 minutes
  • Yield: 2 sandwiches 1x

Description

Looking for easy vegetarian lunch ideas? This delicious chickpea salad sandwich is a vegetarian version of chicken salad made using chickpeas!


Ingredients

Scale
  • 15 ounce can chickpeas
  • 1 rib celery
  • 3 green onions
  • 1 to 2 tablespoons mayonnaise, vegan mayonnaise, or cashew cream
  • 1 tablespoon lemon juice
  • 1 teaspoon celery seed
  • Kosher salt & fresh ground pepper
  • 4 slices bread (try our Homemade Bread)
  • Lettuce, spring green mix, or sprouts
  • Hummus, optional

Instructions

  1. Thinly slice the celery (if it’s large, cut in half lengthwise first). Thinly slice the green onions.
  2. Drain and rinse the chickpeas. In a medium bowl, smash the chickpeas with a fork.
  3. Combine the chickpeas with the chopped celery and green onions, mayonnaise, lemon juice, and celery seed. Add about ¼ to ½ teaspoon kosher salt, depending on your chickpea brand and taste preferences, and fresh ground pepper to taste. Taste and salt until the flavor pops! If the salad is dry, add more mayonnaise (cooked chickpeas have a drier texture than canned).
  4. Assemble the chickpea salad sandwich: If desired, spread the bread with hummus (this amps it up a bit but not required). Top the sandwich with lettuce or greens and chickpea spread.
  • Category: Lunch
  • Method: Raw
  • Cuisine: Sandwich

Keywords: Vegetarian Lunch Ideas

About the authors

Sonja & Alex

Meet Sonja and Alex Overhiser: Husband and wife. Expert home cooks. Authors of recipes you’ll want to make again and again.

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