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Walnuts make healthy eating delicious, we’ll show you how!
Recipes and cooking tips resourced from
All Wholesome Herbs:
The Simple Art of Preparing and Enjoying Whole Plant Foods
If you want to include more walnuts in your diet
but aren’t sure how,
or even if you just want more great ideas,
visit the All Wholesome Herbs site
for free access to their excellent
recipe book and healthy eating guide!
From the All Wholesome Herbs Recipe and Cooking Tips:
Walnuts on Vegetables
Walnuts are perhaps the most universal complement for vegetables to make healthy eating particularly delicious – and nutritious. Walnuts can be served fresh or toasted, whole or crumbed, to complement both sweet and savory dishes. Fresh walnuts bear a mild sweetness, and toasted walnuts add a rich savory or smokey flavor.
If you haven’t yet learned to enjoy walnuts, it’s likely because you’ve only tasted unripe or rancid walnuts. As with most products, including foods, the obsession with appearance has mercilessly sacrificed quality, flavor, and especially nutrition. The industry preference for light-colored (pale) walnuts has unfortunately incentivized farmers to shake the trees and harvest the walnuts before they are ripe. Like green bananas, unripe walnuts may be astringent (dry your mouth out) or bitter. Walnuts that are allowed to properly ripen before harvest are darker in color and richer in flavor, and bear pristine nutrition that can hardly be overestimated.
Although pale (unripe) walnuts can be unpalatable raw, they are aptly rescued by a little toasting.
Toasting Walnuts
A light toasting, whether in the oven or over stovetop, gives walnuts a savor that complements almost any meal. For stovetop cooking, dry-toast walnuts over low heat, stirring frequently, until they are aromatic (a proper word for “smell delicious”). This also works well for barbecue cooking over a grill or fire (see Breakfast Barbecue, Barbecue: Grill or Campfire, and Have Some More S’mores). For oven toasting, spread walnuts evenly in a pan and toast (around 400°F) until they are likewise aromatic (no stirring necessary). You can even just sprinkle your walnuts over your pan of oven-baking vegetables in the last 5 minutes of cooking and let them toast on top. So what if serving might get a little messy, it’s good!
Buying Walnuts
Whenever possible, select walnuts that are darker in color (sometimes called “combo”), especially “natural mix” walnuts shelled and left in their natural blend (unsorted by color), like the walnuts you see on our main page. Walnuts naturally boast a pleasant array of color shades which offer richer flavor and superior nutrition compared to the monotone pale walnuts commonly marketed. Like everything, walnuts are better priced in bulk and will store just fine at room temperature as you use them throughout the month or longer. If your grocery store doesn’t carry dark walnuts in bulk, you can always make the request that they add them to their product line. Alternatively, you can buy your walnuts directly from a walnut packer online where you may get a better price than at a retail grocery store.
Note on Walnut Allergy
Adverse reactions to walnuts may be a result of eating unripe (pale) walnuts raw. Many individuals who have previously had sensitivity to walnuts have found they have no negative reactions when they eat ripe (darker) walnuts, toast their walnuts, or simply combine their walnuts with other foods (see Walnuts on Vegetables).
Walnuts with Breakfast
Walnuts with Dinner
Walnuts with Dessert
Seasonal Recipe: Toasted Walnuts on Pumpkin Soup!
Fall weather brings an abundance of pumpkins, and they’re not just for decoration! Pumpkins boast a sweet-and-savory flavor that is deliciously complemented by toasted walnuts.
Pumpkin Soup Recipe
Cut open pumpkin and remove seeds. Chop pumpkin into small (1-inch-ish) chunks and put in pot with some water. Boil until the pumpkin pokes soft with a fork. Mash the pumpkin in with the cooking water and salt to taste. Top with toasted walnuts and serve!
For more details and additional complementary flavors, see “Savory Pumpkin Soup” in the All Wholesome Herbs recipe book (link below).
Eat like a King on the Budget of a Pauper
Food is expensive these days! As the price of food endlessly escalates, families are looking for ways to cut food costs without cutting nutrition (lest they pay a higher cost later). Pumpkins and walnuts are affordable and highly nutritious, providing your family with the nourishment of a king on the budget of a pauper.