Get ready to convert a salad hater with this gorgeous roasted sweet potato salad, packed with color, flavor, and texture. Just throw your sweet potatoes into the oven, then prep everything else while they roast. The crispy bacon, creamy feta, and crunchy candied seeds make it a guaranteed crowd-pleaser – fabulous for meal prep and the holiday season.
While I 100% crave traditional comfort food in the colder months, I really do LOVE a hearty salad. This isn’t a stereotypical assortment of soggy leaves; this is filling, loaded with flavor, texture, and color, and is destined to become a family favorite.
Salads often get a bad rap for being boring, but this one is FAR from that. It’s got a bit of everything – sweetness from the sweet potatoes and cranberries, saltiness from the bacon and feta, freshness from the spinach and sage, creaminess from the feta (and the sweet potatoes), AND crunch from the salted honey pumpkin seeds. My go-to zesty miso honey mustard dressing ties it all together beautifully.
While it’s filling enough to enjoy alone, and great for meal prep, it’s also fabulous as part of a feasting spread (and wonderful for the holiday season).
Ingredients You’ll Need
- Sweet potatoes. Regular orange sweet potatoes are what I tend to go for as they’re what I can easily pick up at the store, but white or even purple sweet potatoes would be wonderful too. Or, you could use butternut squash or another pumpkin.
- Bacon. Free-range, streaky (American) bacon is best here, but you could use back bacon if you like, or even diced chorizo. You could also use turkey bacon if you prefer.
- Dried cranberries. This makes the salad a fab festive option, but you could use raisins, sultanas, or dried apricots instead if you like.
- Spinach. I prefer to use baby leaf spinach as it’s easier to mix through the salad (and eat), plus it tends not to have long stems. Kale is also an excellent choice.
- Feta. Go for a creamy feta if you can, I find it mixes with the salad better.
- Pumpkin seeds. I LOVE using these for color and crunch, but you could use sunflower seeds or even nuts like pecans, almonds, or cashews.
- Sage. Swap this lovely festive herb for flat-leaf parsley, basil, thyme, or chives if you like.
You’ll need white miso paste, honey, Dijon or whole grain mustard, olive oil, lemon juice, and a couple of garlic cloves for the dressing.
How to Make the Roasted Sweet Potato Salad
Dice your sweet potatoes, toss with olive oil, salt, and paprika, and roast until lovely and charred around the edges.
While the sweet potato is in the oven, cook your crispy bacon, make the salted honey pumpkin seeds, mix the miso dressing, and get all the other ingredients ready.
Add the sweet potato, bacon, dried cranberries, feta, spinach, sage, and half the pumpkin seeds to a large bowl. Pour over the dressing, toss to combine, then scatter over the rest of the pumpkin seeds to serve.
Roasted Sweet Potato Salad FAQs
You can prepare everything in advance – you can even mix everything EXCEPT the spinach leaves – and then just mix through the spinach before you serve. Everything will keep well in the fridge for 5 days, but the spinach will soften considerably, which is why I always recommend mixing it at the last minute if you’re entertaining.
Yes, you can. Just skip the bacon!
While this is hearty enough to be enjoyed on its own, it’s fab as part of a wider spread. Pair it with juicy herb roast chicken, miso grilled chicken or crispy pork belly, no-peel roast potatoes, tomato and grilled peach salad, rainbow chopped salad or green goddess salad for a lovely, colorful spread (this would also be an excellent Christmas menu!)
Watch How to Make the Salad
Like this recipe? Here are more salad ideas for you
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Roasted Sweet Potato Salad with Feta and Bacon
Ingredients
Method
- Roast the sweet potatoes. Heat your oven to 400°F (200°C fan) and line a sheet pan with parchment paper. Chop your sweet potatoes into bite-sized chunks, then arrange them in the pan. Drizzle them with olive oil, paprika, and 1 teaspoon of salt, then toss to combine well. Spread the sweet potato chunks onto one layer (this will ensure they roast evenly), then pop them into the oven and roast for about 30 minutes, until they're charred around the edges and soft in the middle (pierce one with a knife to check).
- Cook the bacon. Add the bacon slices to a dry pan and set it over medium heat. Cook for about five minutes, flipping a couple of times throughout, until it's super crispy. Remove from the pan and chop or crumble it into small pieces.
- Make the salted honey pumpkin seeds. Place a piece of parchment paper onto a small plate. Give the pan a quick wipe, then add the pumpkin seeds and set it over low heat. Toast the seeds, stirring constantly, for a couple of minutes until they start to pop and smell 'toasty'.At this point, add 2 teaspoons of honey and scatter over ½ teaspoon of salt. Stir them through the pumpkin seeds as the honey bubbles up, then transfer to the lined plate to crisp up. Spread the mixture into a single layer on the plate.
- Mix the dressing. Add 2 tablespoons lemon juice, ¼ cup olive oil, 1 tablespoon miso paste, 1 tablespoon mustard, 2 teaspoons honey, and 2 crushed garlic cloves to a small bowl or a jar with a lid. Use a fork to mix really well into a cohesive dressing. If you're using a jar with a lid, give it a good shake.
- Assemble the salad. Add the roasted sweet potatoes, spinach leaves, feta, crispy bacon, dried cranberries, chopped sage, and half the crispy pumpkin seeds to a large mixing bowl. Pour the dressing all over the salad, then toss everything well to combine. Transfer to a serving bowl or platter, then scatter over the remaining pumpkin seeds to serve.
