Vegetarian Recipes

Green Harissa Grilled Cheese

https://www.loveandlemons.com/grilled-cheese/

Do you ever have days when you just need a grilled cheese sandwich? This green harissa grilled cheese recipe is what I make when nothing but a grilled cheese will do. It has all the essentials of a good grilled cheese sandwich – crunchy, toasty bread and gooey cheese – but a handful of spinach and a slather of green harissa add an extra dimension of freshness and flavor. It’s lightly spicy and totally delicious – hands down the best grilled cheese I’ve had!

The green harissa is really the star of the show here. Made with charred peppers, garlic, lemon, spices, cilantro, pepitas, and olive oil, it has a similar texture to pesto and a delicious spiced flavor. It’s easy to make in the food processor, and it really jazzes up this classic comfort food. I hope you love it as much as I do!

How to Make Grilled Cheese

A basic grilled cheese requires just 3 ingredients:

Sliced bread – Sourdough is my favorite!
Cheese – I like Havarti.
Butter or olive oil – As usual, extra-virgin olive oil is my pick.

I love to dress up this classic combo with green harissa and spinach, but really, when it comes to grilled cheese, your filling options are endless. Swap in your favorite cheese, and skip the harissa if you like. A slather of chipotle sauce or pesto would be great in its place. If you’re not in the mood for spinach, leave it out, or add some thin tomato or pepper slices, roasted red peppers, or arugula instead.

Once you’ve assembled your ingredients, it’s time to cook! If you’re using it, slather the harissa onto a slice of bread and add some spinach and a thick layer of grated cheese. Top with the remaining slice of bread, drizzle with olive oil (or spread with butter), and grill your sandwich on both sides until the bread becomes golden brown and the cheese melts.

Serve with tomato soup or gazpacho, and enjoy!

My Best Grilled Cheese Sandwich Tips

Want to make the best grilled cheese sandwich you’ve ever had? Just follow these easy tips!

Better ingredients = a better sandwich. As with all simple recipes, the better your ingredients are, the better your grilled cheese will be. I like mine with sourdough bread and Havarti or sharp cheddar cheese.
Use a good melting cheese. Because higher-moisture cheeses yield the best oozy, pull-apart sandwiches, steer clear of crumbly, hard cheeses like Parmesan or manchego. I use Havarti here (Roth Cheese is a favorite), but gruyere, gouda, provolone, mozzarella, and cheddar are all great choices for a grilled cheese sandwich.
Cover for even cooking. If your bread is browning faster than your cheese is melting, reduce the heat to low and cover the pan. The trapped heat will help melt the cheese before the bread gets too brown.
Toast both sides of the bread. This step isn’t entirely necessary, but it’s totally worth it. Before you add your fillings, get the inside face of your bread a little toasty in the pan. Then, load it up and grill on the outside, flipping halfway. Your bread will have a crave-worthy crunch that’s a perfect contrast to the creamy, cheesy middle.

For a more traditional (red) harissa recipe, check out page 281 in my new cookbook, Love & Lemons Every Day. This zippy green version is very different, but just as delicious! If you have extra harissa after making this recipe, it’s yummy scooped onto tacos, avocado toast, grilled veggies, pizza slices, falafel flatbread, and especially these shawarma wraps.

If you love this grilled cheese recipe…

Try my egg salad sandwich, vegan club sandwich, or meatball sandwich next!

Green Harissa Grilled Cheese

Author: Jeanine Donofrio

Recipe type: main course

2 green Anaheim peppers (or 1 poblano)
2 garlic cloves
2 tablespoons lemon juice
½ teaspoon ground cumin
½ teaspoon ground coriander
½ teaspoon sea salt
½ teaspoon honey or maple syrup
¾ cup cilantro
¼ cup pepitas
2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
freshly ground black pepper

8 sourdough bread slices
A few handfuls of spinach leaves
2 to 3 cups grated havarti cheese
Extra-virgin oil, for grilling

Make the green harissa. Char the peppers over a gas burner or under a broiler until the skin is blackened all over. Remove from the heat and place in a bowl and cover with a towel or plastic wrap for 10 minutes. Slice off the stem and place the peppers, garlic, lemon juice, cumin, coriander, salt, honey, cilantro, pepitas and a few grinds of black pepper into a food processor and pulse until combined. Drizzle in the olive oil and process until smooth.
Make the grilled cheese. Slather the green harissa on the insides of each slice of bread. Assemble with spinach leaves and cheese. Pre-heat a cast iron skillet or grill pan over medium heat. Brush the outsides of the sandwich with olive oil and grill on each side until the cheese is melted.

Cheesy Vegetarian

Easy Mediterranean Lentil Meatballs

Don’t you just love it when a recipe is as simple as ‘mix + bake’? No pre-cooking, no unnecessary extra steps – just mix together all of the ingredients, and pop it in the oven. And that’s just the case for these vegetarian lentil meatballs (lentil balls? vegeballs? meatlessballs?). They couldn’t be easier.

Other easy ‘mix and bake’ recipes → easy nut roast; baked fajita rice; Boursin pasta.

Vegetarian Mediterranean lentil meatballs served with spaghetti and tomato sauce.

I served my lentil balls with spaghetti and tomato sauce – spaghetti and meatballs is such a classic that’s hard to improve on. If you prefer, you could equally serve these vegetarian meatballs with couscous and tzatziki, stuffed into pitta bread, or even just eaten straight from the oven (no judgment here). They’re packed with Mediterranean-inspired flavours, and they’re super versatile.

Mediterranean lentil meatballs on a baking tray.

What’s in these Lentil Meatballs?

The basic recipe for these lentil meatballs is canned lentils + flour + egg (the same base I used for my cheesy lentil burgers). Once you’ve got that far, you can jazz things up however you like. I added:

black olives
sun-dried tomatoes
parmesan-style cheese
fresh basil
garlic

If you like, you could easily switch things up to bring a different flavour profile to your meatballs – maybe you could make a Tex-Mex version, or use some Indian spices, for example.

Cheesy Vegetarian Bakes ebook on an ipad screen.

Sign up to get recipes by email, and get a FREE e-cookbook!

(1-2 emails per week, no spam)

Ingredients

Here’s what you’ll need to make these vegetarian meatballs. See the printable recipe card below for detailed ingredient quantities.

cooked lentils. I used lentils from a can, because they’re so convenient – just drain them well, and they’re ready to use. If you can’t get canned lentils, you can boil dried brown or green lentils until they’re soft, then continue with the recipe as written. I would not recommend using red lentils for this recipe, as they will not give quite the same end result.
eggs
plain flour (I used wholemeal for extra fibre)
sun-dried tomatoes
black olives
parmesan-style cheese. ‘Real’ parmesan isn’t vegetarian, but there are plenty of vegetarian alternatives, which are very similar. Often, supermarkets sell a generic ‘Italian hard cheese’, which is usually vegetarian.
fresh basil
garlic granules

Spaghetti with tomato sauce and Mediterranean lentil meatballs.

Printable Instructions

Mediterranean Lentil Meatballs

Easy vegetarian lentil meatballs, made extra tasty with Mediterranean-inspired ingredients. These are so simple – just mix and bake!

Course Main meal

Cuisine Italian, Mediterranean

Diet Vegetarian

Prep Time 15

Cook Time 20

Total Time 35

Servings meatballs

Calories 216kcal

Author Becca Heyes

Ingredients

2 x 390g tins green lentils, thoroughly drained (470g, or ~ 2 2/3 cups, in total when drained)
2 eggs
2 Tablespoons sliced black olives, roughly chopped
5 pieces sun-dried tomatoes, roughly chopped
50 g (~ 1/2 cup) finely grated vegetarian parmesan-style cheese
1 teaspoon garlic granules
Few sprigs fresh basil, roughly chopped
85 g (~ 2/3 cup) plain flour (I used wholemeal)

Instructions

Preheat the oven to 190°C (Gas Mark 5 / 375°F). Add all of the ingredients, except for the flour, to a large mixing bowl. Use a fork to mix the ingredients thoroughly. It’s fine if the lentils get a little mashed up.
Add the flour, and mix well to combine.
Lightly grease a baking sheet. Use clean hands to form the mixture into ball shapes, and place them on the tray. The mixture will be quite sticky – they don’t have to be perfect balls. I managed to get 25 balls from the mixture.
Bake for approximately 20-25 minutes, until the lentil balls are slightly crispy and just firm.
Serve with spaghetti and tomato sauce, if desired.

Nutrition

Recipe FAQs

Can I prepare these lentil balls in advance?

You could certainly mix together the ingredients in advance, and then store the mixture in a sealed container in the fridge for a day or so, until you’re ready to shape and bake the balls. The meatballs are tastiest when freshly baked, but if needed, you could even bake them in advance, and then reheat when you’re ready to eat them.

Can I freeze these lentil meatballs?

I didn’t experiment with freezing these balls, but it’s the sort of recipe I have had luck with freezing in the past, so I definitely think it’s worth a try.

How should I reheat leftover vegetarian meatballs?

The easiest way to reheat these lentil meatballs is in the microwave. They do dry out a little and lose their crispiness when reheated, but they’re still tasty. Alternatively, you could re-crisp them in the oven or air fryer.

How should I serve vegetarian lentil balls?

I served my meatballs with spaghetti and tomato sauce, which worked beautifully. You could alternatively serve them stuffed into pitta bread with some tzatziki, or alongside some mashed potato.