These days, meal planning is really catching on— and I get it. There are so many benefits to meal planning; from planning for nutrition, to reducing food waste, helping younger family members, or to give your own brain a break. There are so many different reasons that people are benefiting from planning their meals.

Also, there are a lot of people out there who can’t, or don’t. Honestly, that’s me most of the time; and that’s valid.

Batch recipes like this are perfect for either group of people, or anyone in-between. You can easily make as much farro as you want, mix with the dressings, and store in an air-tight container for a whole workweek. 

Then, place the greens and veggies in a separate container. I would suggest including a damp paper towel in the container, to keep the herbs fresh and green. These should stay good-to-go for about five days, as well— making this a perfect lunch or snack for an entire workweek. 

Here is a simple step-by-step recipe for this Farro salad. I have been posting simple how-to slides to my Instagram stories and highlight reel and I thought it would be cool to start posting those here too, with a little bit more explanation for each slide, just in case anything could use a little more of a breakdown. 

Let me know how y’all like this format!

Ingredients list:

Farro, uncooked – 7 oz
Water – 32 fl oz
Salt – to taste
Bay Leaves – 2 ea
Olive oil – 3 fl oz
Lemon juice – 2 fl oz
Balsamic Vinegar – ½ fl oz
Parsley, chopped – 3 cups
Dill, ch. – 1 cup
Mint, ch. – 1 cup
Cherry tomatoes, halved – 1 cup
Cucumbers, peeled, diced – 1 cup

The process of cooking farro is similar to cooking most other grains, such as quinoa or rice. 

First, place the raw farro, water, salt and bay leaves into a pot. Bring this up to a boil, and then reduce to a simmer. Cover the pot, and let everything rest until the farro is tender & the liquid has been absorbed. 

When you are cooking grains – especially thick grains like farro – you must include salt in the boiling liquid. If you season a grain after it is cooked, you only season the outside of it; then when you bite into it, it’ll be bland. If you cook the grains in salt, the salt will be absorbed throughout the grain, and accentuate its natural flavors and depth completely.

You can also use any other seasonings you’d like during cooking farro, or even swap vegetable broth for water for a real richness. 

While the farro is cooking, create your mise en place for the rest of the salad.

When the farro is finished, place the farro onto a sheet tray to rapid cool. This will allow it to cool safely, and also to prevent the grains from sticking to each other. Remember to remove bay leaves!

The amount of herbs, greens & veggies you use is completely to taste, and what you want the texture of the final salad to be. The type of bitter greens you use is also completely up to you; some examples include arugula, mustard greens or kale.

The liquid measurements are the right amount to coat all of the grain completely— feel free to use less! You can definitely remove the oil, and use only vinegar & lemon juice to be oil-free.

To make sure this dressing is evenly dispersed throughout all of the grain, the order you add these into the bowl does matter!

In a large salad bowl, whisk together each of the liquids slowly, and the salt. Whisk quickly enough, and add the liquids slowly enough, to  create an emulsification. 

Once the liquids have combined into one cohesive dressing, add in the cooled farro and fold the dressing into it.

When you’re ready to eat or serve this salad, add the greens, cherry tomatoes, cucumbers and herbs per dish. Enjoy!

Thanks for reading!

~ Chef G