These Chickpea Fajita Meal Prep Bowls are packed with tons of vegetables and protein and are perfect for a healthy and filling vegan meal prep lunch!
So, I had planned on posting this recipe as part of my meal prep/30 minute dinner January, but then baby Sawyer came early and I’ve been mostly spending my days laying on the couch, nursing a newborn and watching tv 🙂
I’m finally getting my energy back though and thinking I need to carve out some time to do some lunch meal prep because I’ve been surviving mostly on peanut butter and jelly sandwiches these days.
Don’t get me wrong, I actually love peanut butter and jelly, but in these postpartum days it’s really important to nourish yourself with warm, hearty meals. I made these Chickpea Fajita Meal Prep Bowls quite a while ago and they’ve become one of my favorite meal prep recipes.
Quinoa and chickpeas are regular ingredients around here and I love when I can make a fun, flavorful pesto to go onto of my bowls. This Cilantro Lime pesto is one of my favorites! I used it first in this meal prep recipe and it’s such a great topping that’s packed with tons spinach and cilantro! I love when I can add a fresh green sauce to my meals.
Roasted chickpeas are an ingredient I’ve been loving lately. I put them into a lot of my bowls and my 2 year old really enjoyed them too. One of these days I’m planning to get a post out with a few different flavors of roasted chickpeas, so I hope you guys like them too! They add such a perfect texture to any recipe and are great with so many different flavors.
Recipe Tips for Chickpea Fajita Meal Prep Bowls with Cilantro Lime Pesto:
- If you don’t have a huge sheet pan, like the size of your oven, then you may want to roast the peppers and chickpeas in two batches. It’s a lot of food and may take longer to roast if it doesn’t have much room to spread out on the tray.
- Feel free to add any other roasted veggies you like.
- You can sub the quinoa for any other grain you like, or cauliflower rice.
Chickpea Fajita Meal Prep Bowls with Cilantro Lime Pesto
- Total Time: 55 minutes
- Yield: 4 1x
- Diet: Vegan
Description
These Chickpea Fajita Meal Prep Bowls are packed with tons of vegetables and protein and are perfect for a healthy and filling vegan meal prep lunch!
Ingredients
- 3/4 cup dry quinoa
- 4 cups diced bell peppers, what ever colors you like
- 1/2 onion, diced
- 2 (15 oz) cans chickpeas, drained and rinsed
- 3 teaspoons olive oil
- 1 1/2 teaspoon garlic powder
- 1 1/2 teaspoons ground cumin
- 1 1/2 teaspoons paprika
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 1/2 teaspoon black pepper
Cilantro Lime Pesto:
- 2 cup baby spinach leaves
- 1 cup cilantro leaves
- 1/4 cup chopped walnuts, or your favorite nut
- 3 tablespoons nutritional yeast
- Juice of 1 lime
- 1 clove garlic, minced
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 1/4 cup olive oil
Instructions
- Cook quinoa according to package directions. Let sit covered for about 5 minutes, fluff with a fork and divide evenly into 4 meal prep containers.
- Pre-heat oven to 400 degrees F. On a large sheet pan add the peppers, onion and chickpeas (I like to keep my peppers and chickpeas separate for aesthetic reasons but you can also just mix everything together) and toss together with olive oil and spices. I like to use a really large sheet pan to bake this meal since it’s a lot of food and it cooks faster, but you could also separate it onto two pans if you have smaller ones.
- Bake until veggies are cooked through and chickpeas are getting crispy, 30-35 minutes. Let cool for a few minutes and then transfer equal portions to meal prep containers.
- Add all Cilantro Lime Pesto ingredients to a food processor, or blender, and blend until creamy. You can either put the pesto into small containers to take with you or top it on your meal prep bowls. You may not need to use all the pesto, depending on how much you like.
- Prep Time: 20 mins
- Cook Time: 35 mins
- Category: Lunch, Meal Prep, Vegan, Gluten Free
- Method: Oven
- Cuisine: American
This is one of my new favorite recipes. It’s great for using up leftover cilantro, not to mention it’s absolutely delicious! I also tried cooking the peppers/onions & chickpeas on a griddle with the lid on, since summer in Texas is toooooo hot for the oven. The texture wasn’t quite as good as oven roasted, but it was still pretty yummy. Anyway, this has become a staple in our house. Thanks for the great recipe!
That is so nice to hear!! Thank you! 🙂
This recipe looks amazing, but my husband and I don’t do cilantro (I know, I know, that’s blasphemous). Anything you can recommend we replace that with? Wondering if just parsley would work. Thanks!
Parsley or basil would work well!
I’m with you, I really dig roasted chickpeas! I used to mix these spicy pumpkin panko bread crumbs in with the roasted chickpeas and it was SO so good. Eh, I think that you deserve a couple weeks of PB&Js before getting back into the swing of things with on-point eating! 😉