Smoky Roasted Cauliflower & Chickpea Tacos

Smoky Roasted Cauliflower & Chickpea Tacos are the best vegan tacos ever! Whip up an easy mango-avocado salsa and pickled red onions to take them over the top!

This week’s post was supposed to be lighthearted, and I suppose, in the end, it will be. After all, we’re talking about tacos here. Tacos! Arguably the most joyful of foods. But there’s something heavier that’s weighing on me, and I think I need to talk about it here. I was supposed to be celebrating this week. I applied for a job several months ago that would have been an absolute dream. It used my degree, and not just that — it used my degree to work towards a more sustainable, accessible, and healthy foodscape for all. In case it wasn’t clear, my ultimate career goal is to change the food system in any way I can.

They contacted me to complete several written assignments and interviews, and when they finally asked for my references, I was over the moon. Surely, I’ll get the call telling me they loved me and want me to start immediately, I thought. And I did get a call, but it wasn’t the one I expected. I was runner-up. Second choice out of 300-plus. In retrospect, I’m still proud of myself for that, but now I’m back at square one.

Rejection is a strange, humbling feeling.

I felt myself tumble through the stages of grief, one after another, in rapid succession. Denial: surely they’ve made a mistake. They switched our numbers. This can’t be happening. Anger: how dare they choose someone other than me? Bargaining: maybe if I grovel enough or send them just a few more references they’ll reconsider. Depression: *sobs audibly*. And finally, in an overwhelming wash of relief, acceptance. It is what it is. C’est la vie. What’s meant to be will be, and all that. And ultimately, the understanding that I still support them as an organization, that the candidate they chose is just as deserving as me, and that we will both undoubtedly go on to do incredible things. While I’m not overjoyed about the fact that I have to dust off my cover letter again, I’ve grown to accept that this opportunity may not have been meant for me. Perhaps, instead, there’s another one headed down the chute. Above all, this experience has been an exercise in humility and patience. The right job will come; it will just take time. Through all of this, I’ve realized that I don’t have to wait for another platform to evoke the change I wish to see in the world. I can make that change right here. I can talk about those things right now, and if I’m loud enough, and other people join me and they’re loud enough too, maybe someone, somewhere, will listen. Here, we’ll start a conversation about the food system. Regardless of our position in it, it touches each of us in some way. In order to affect any real change, we must come to understand our own relationships with the Earth and the food it yields for us. And frankly, there’s a lot of change that needs to happen.

So let’s talk about these tacos as a vehicle for change.

These particular tacos have a few components that make them the perfect conversation piece for this topic. They are:

1. Plant-based. Good for you, good for the planet, good in general.
2. Affordable, clocking in at around $2.27 per two-taco serving.
3. Approachable. They’re not too far off from the quintessential “American” taco, meaning they’re a good thing to serve to anyone, anywhere, at any time.
4. Delicious. The most important piece.

And those four components make up the basis of my personal cooking credo. So let’s talk about them in a little more detail, shall we?

1. Plant-Based

If you’ve been paying attention, you might have noticed that I mostly post vegetarian recipes here on the ol’ FW. This isn’t because I myself am vegetarian, but because too many plates are severely lacking in the vegetable department. The internet is overflowing with recipes that boast loads of cheese and meat and milk (which I wholeheartedly admit are delicious!), but there still aren’t enough actually good veg-heavy recipes out there. And let’s face it. We all know we’re supposed to be eating our vegetables. But there’s something standing between us and our daily serving of greens. I think it’s a fundamental misunderstanding of how we should prepare our veggies. Maybe, if we re-learned how to treat vegetables — if we learned to give them the TLC they deserve, so they end up as tasty as we deserve — we could finally ditch that depressing iceberg-tomato-cucumber salad trope. Eating plants doesn’t have to be sad or tasteless. It can be delicious. Just look at these friggin’ tacos.

2. Affordable

There’s nothing I find more irritating than a “healthy” recipe that uses 8,000 different ingredients, all of which are only sold at super-obscure health food stores. That’s great and all; I’m happy for you and your collection of assorted superfood powders. I like them too, for what it’s worth, but they’re not going to help someone who’s struggling to put food on the table. I want my recipes to be accessible for everyone, because health isn’t some exclusive club with an annual membership fee. Contrary to popular belief, you can cook delicious, healthy meals that don’t break the bank. And you can make them with ingredients from any regular grocery store! The spices are the most expensive part of this recipe. I consider spices to be a long-term investment; while $4 for a bottle of smoked paprika might seem like a lot when you’re putting it in your cart, you have to remember that bottle will last for months, if not longer. This recipe uses about 40 cents’ worth of spices. If you don’t have some of the ones I’ve listed, just omit them! Get creative. Let your intuition guide you. You might come up with something even more delicious!

3. Approachable

This brings me back to superfood powders. Not only is spirulina powder wildly expensive; it’s also super obscure, hard to find, and kind of a scary green color. My point here is that, in order to affect a real change in the food system, we need to take foods that people already know and love (like tacos!) and health-ify them. Take it from me, as a person whose past eating habits left much to be desired. No one is going to transition straight from fast food to fresh-pressed celery juice. It ain’t gonna happen. That’s why I strive to make my recipes fun, colorful, and approachable. Healthy food shouldn’t be intimidating!

4. DELICIOUS!

Duh! Ya gotta use your spice cabinet, y’all. There’s a whole world of flavors out there just waiting for you. I promise I’ll never lead you astray. Anything I post on here needs to pass the deliciousness test, first and foremost. Everything else is just an added bonus. Take these tacos, for example. The spice blend is smoky, savory, and spicy. The mango-avocado salsa hits all the right notes from salty to tangy to sweet. And those quick-pickled red onions? They add a pop of acidity that brightens everything it touches. Top ’em with hot sauce, more cilantro, guacamole, a sprinkling of cheese, you name it. You’re gonna love them, and your body will too. What other health-ified recipes do you want to see?

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