This kale and sweet potato salad recipe just might be one of the best fall salads. Enjoy tender kale, spiced, roasted sweet potatoes, apples, and a homemade maple Dijon dressing.
This kale and sweet potato salad has been on repeat for the last two weeks. It has everything I love in a great salad: hearty greens, serious texture, and an epic homemade dressing. The texture comes from massaged, tender kale, roasted sweet potatoes, crispy apples, and toasted nuts, while the dressing is a spin-off of our popular honey mustard dressing made with maple syrup.
Save this salad for meatless dinners, as a side to your favorite fall dishes, or for holiday entertaining. It absolutely works on a Thanksgiving table! For more like this, see our tahini kale salad and our coconut oil roasted sweet potatoes.
Key Ingredients
Kale: We stick with curly kale for this salad and find it to be a bit more tender, but feel free to use other varieties. Either way, you’ll strip the leaves from the stems and massage them with a tiny bit of olive oil and salt. This tenderizes the kale, making it much more enjoyable to eat.
Sweet Potato: We use one good-sized sweet potato. We peeled it for the photos, but that’s up to you (we don’t peel our potato for sweet potato fries). If you have winter squash on hand, feel free to swap that in for the sweet potato. See our roasted butternut squash recipe for tips on peeling and chopping it.
Spices: Before roasting it, toss your sweet potato with salt, pepper, and smoked paprika. The combo is perfect against the potato’s sweetness and works nicely with our dressing.
Apple: One crunchy apple is perfect. We usually have Honeycrisp or Fuji on hand, but use whatever you like!
Nuts and Seeds: We suggest sliced almonds and hemp seeds in the recipe below, but again, you can adjust based on what you have on hand. Walnuts, pistachios, pine nuts, and sunflower seeds are all great options.
The Dressing: This might be my new favorite! We took our honey mustard dressing and swapped the honey for pure maple syrup. It’s so good! You’ll need Dijon mustard, maple syrup, apple cider vinegar, lemon juice, and olive oil.
Find the full recipe with measurements below.
How to Make Our Kale and Sweet Potato Salad
First, get the sweet potatoes roasting in the oven. Chop them into 1-inch pieces, then toss with a bit of olive oil, salt, pepper, and smoked paprika. Spread in a single layer and roast in a 400-degree oven until tender. Remove the baking sheet and let the potatoes cool until just warm.
While the sweet potatoes roast, massage and marinate the kale. Here’s the secret for the best kale salads. Twenty to thirty minutes before you plan on eating the salad, massage the kale leaves with a tiny bit of olive oil and a pinch of salt. Scrunch and rub the kale for a minute, or until it feels softer and more tender. Then, set it aside to sit with the oil and salt until the sweet potatoes are ready.
Finally, make the dressing and assemble. This dressing only needs a quick whisk (or shake in a jar). Whisk the Dijon, maple syrup, vinegar, lemon juice, salt, pepper, and olive oil until blended and slightly thickened. Then, toss it with the kale, roasted sweet potatoes, apples, nuts, and seeds.
What to Serve With This Salad
This kale sweet potato salad works nicely as a standalone salad or on the side to other dishes. It also lasts well in an airtight container in the fridge for a few days! We’ve really enjoyed having this salad in our fridge lately. Here are a few things we’ve enjoyed it next to:
More Fall Salads to Try
Kale Sweet Potato Salad with Maple Dijon Dressing
PREP
COOK
TOTAL
This kale salad with spiced roasted sweet potatoes is fantastic as written, but is also a great base for more toppings. Consider a cheese like crumbled, soft goat cheese, cubed Cheddar, or grilled halloumi. Feel free to substitute the nuts and seeds for what you have on hand, too!
4 Servings
You Will Need
For the Salad
1 large sweet potato (about 15 ounces), peeled and cut into ¾ inch cubes
1 tablespoon extra-virgin olive oil, plus 1 teaspoon for the kale
¼ teaspoon fine sea salt, plus a pinch for the kale
¼ teaspoon smoked paprika
¼ teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
1 bunch curly kale (about 7 ounces)
1 medium apple, cored and cut into ¾ inch cubes
⅓ cup sliced almonds, toasted
2 tablespoons hemp seeds (optional)
For the Maple Dijon Dressing
2 tablespoons Dijon mustard
1 ½ tablespoons pure maple syrup
1 tablespoon apple cider vinegar or more to taste
1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice
⅛ teaspoon fine sea salt
⅛ teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
Directions
1Heat the oven to 400°F (200°C) and line a baking sheet with parchment paper. Mound the sweet potatoes in the middle and drizzle with 1 tablespoon of olive oil, ¼ teaspoon salt, smoked paprika, and black pepper. Toss to coat, then spread into a single layer. When the oven is preheated, roast the potatoes, stirring once, until tender and just beginning to turn a light golden brown, 25 to 30 minutes. Remove from the oven and let cool until just warm.
2While the potatoes roast, strip the kale from the stems (these are too tough for the salad). Tear the leaves into 1- to 2-inch pieces, then rinse under cold water. Pat dry with paper towels, then use clean hands to rub 1 teaspoon of olive oil and a pinch of salt into the kale. Massage the leaves until they feel a bit more tender. Set aside on the counter to tenderize even more until the sweet potatoes are ready.
3Make the dressing: combine the mustard, maple syrup, apple cider vinegar, lemon juice, ⅛ teaspoon salt, and ⅛ teaspoon black pepper, and whisk until well blended and creamy. Whisk in the olive oil, and then taste the dressing. Adjust with additional salt, vinegar, or maple syrup.
4To assemble the salad, toss the massaged kale with the sweet potatoes, apples, almonds, hemp seeds if using, and the dressing.
Adam and Joanne’s Tips
Storing: This salad lasts well in the fridge. Keep it in an airtight container in the fridge for up to 4 days. As it sits, the kale tenderizes even more. You might want to serve your leftover salad with a lemon wedge, which wakes the dressing back up and makes it nice and zippy.
The nutrition facts provided are estimates. We did include the optional hemp seeds.
Nutrition Per Serving Serving Size 1 of 4 servings (about 2 cups) / Calories 261 / Total Fat 18.2g / Saturated Fat 2.2g / Cholesterol 0mg / Sodium 439mg / Carbohydrate 21.8g / Dietary Fiber 3.9g / Total Sugars 11.5g / Protein 4.6g
AUTHOR:
Joanne Gallagher
We are Adam and Joanne Gallagher, the creators of Inspired Taste. Established in 2009, Inspired Taste grew from a childhood dream into one of the internet’s most trusted recipe sites with hundreds of reliable recipes, step-by-step videos, and expert tips.More About Us
