21 Veggie-Forward Lunches You’ll Actually Look Forward to Eating Every Day

Here’s a simple yet satisfying way to get more vegetables into your day. Feel free to experiment, changing up the vegetables you use based on what’s in season, as well as the bread. Tortillas make good wraps, and the fillings are excellent in pita bread.

Crisp vegetables, a spicy sweet dressing, and soba noodles combine to make a refreshing and filling lunch. Add tofu for protein.

This salad from Alice Waters’ restaurant Lulu highlights farmers market broccolini with a boost of flavor from fresh herbs and carrots that are mixed into quickly cooked lentils.

The eggplant and tomatoes take just a few minutes to cook on a hot grill. Creamy Greek yogurt sauce adds a tangy flavor.

This makes eight servings so you can meal-prep the chili and eat it throughout the week. Serve it with Che Fico Chef David Nayfeld’s Brown Butter Maple Cornbread.

With its exotic notes of saffron and smoke, tenderness and crunch, this is a meal that doesn’t get old. All of its components last at least a week in the refrigerator and months in the freezer, so you can thaw them and assemble whenever you like. Look for dukkah, an Egyptian spice blend, at well-stocked grocery stores, Middle Eastern markets, and online. Or make your own: Blend 1/4 tsp. each sesame seeds, ground coriander and cumin, dried thyme, and finely chopped roasted hazelnuts.

“You can make this recipe with any kind of cheese,” says Peggy Smith, co-owner of Northern California’s Cowgirl Creamery. The recipe is based on one in Cowgirl Creamery Cooks (Chronicle Books), which Smith wrote with her business partner, Sue Conley. The key is to use a variety of different-textured cheeses–moist with dry, elastic with hard. Herbs are nice in this sandwich: Conley used Thai basil from her garden on the day we visited. The bread came from Della Fattoria, a terrific bakery in downtown Petaluma, not far from Conley’s house.

Bring together some of our favorite vegetarian flavors in this dish. Don’t forget to bring out the warm pita or lavash.

Great for a light meal, these wraps get their bold flavor from an easy, no-cook peanut sauce.

Scared to try a veggie burger? This one will make you a believer. Packed with lentils and healthy veggies, we promise you will never even miss the meat.

With the brightness of cactus and smoky heat of chipotles, this is one of our favorite ways to make quesadillas. Blended corn-wheat tortillas get nice and crisp in the oven.

Pan-searing sliced tofu gives it a meatiness that’s deliciously offset by crunchy vegetables and a drizzle of black bean sauce (pour on a little less if you’re salt-sensitive). The Asian ingredients can be found in any large grocery store.

Fancified with briny capers, fresh dill, and lemon zest, this isn’t your normal egg salad sandwich.

The spicy flavor of kimchi makes it a natural filling for quesadillas and a good contrast with mild, buttery avocado.

For a sandwich rendition of the classic Italian salad, Homegrown Sustainable Sandwich Shop in the Seattle area loads up rolls with cherry tomatoes (such as Sun Gold) and mini mozzarella balls. A thick layer of pesto makes it extra-memorable. The shop wouldn’t reveal how the pesto keeps its bright color when they bake the sandwich in the oven, but we suspect they blanch the herb leaves, as we’ve done here.

Imagine a classic Asian-style rice bowl, but with a risotto-like blend of millet and amaranth as the base.

The vegetables in these sandwiches don’t get soggy as they stand, and the flavors benefit from a little time together.

The variety of the vegetables, two kinds of legumes, and the Italian trick of cooking a bit of parmesan rind in the soup for added flavor create a palate-pleasing minestrone miles beyond the bland bean-and-pasta version so often served. The soup is flexible too; add your favorite vegetables or use whatever is bountiful in your garden this harvest. This soup keeps frozen for up to 3 months.

This version of bánh mì comes together quickly. Toss shredded daikon and carrots with seasoned rice vinegar; season mayo with minced chipotle chile; and season hoisin with minced ginger and lemongrass. Layer into a baguette with sprigs of cilantro and this super-flavorful tofu. Short skewers help hold the sandwich together.

The ingredients will keep for a while so you can make these sandwiches throughout the week.

This soup has two layers of kumquats–cooked in the soup to become mellow and tender, and finely chopped with parsley for a bright topping.