This bulgur wheat salad makes a delicious, high protein meal. Dressed with a sweet orange and tangy dijon mustard dressing, you won’t put it down.

Here’s the thing about bulgur wheat salad.

It’s hard to write about at 6:37am.

Was it delicious? Yes.

Did almost all our friends who came over on Saturday night try it and like it? Yes.

Have I been sneaking leftover spoonfuls here and there out of the fridge.

Maaaaybe.

I usually write these posts at night, cozied up with a mug of tea and whatever snack sounds good at the moment.

I take my sweet time transferring and editing pictures, I click over to twitter to see what’s going on, I write a little, I have a gchat conversation here and there, I read other blogs and eventually I finish the post and get it scheduled, approximately 2.5-3 hours after I started.

I’m not very efficient.

Yesterday we hiked, Ginger had the best day of her life between running through muddy streams, riding in a Jeep with no windows and visiting my parents’ house with their 2 dogs and when we got home I just wanted to collapse.

I didn’t have the energy for 2.5-3 hours of dilly-dallying.

So I went to bed.

That being said, a bulgur wheat salad is hard to describe when you’re up almost 2 hours before you normally would be and you haven’t even had a cup of coffee yet, let alone breakfast.

I’ll try though. Just for you guys.

Even though the thought of those onions right now could make me gag.

I’ve actually never cooked with bulgur wheat before this.

I went into the grocery store looking for black rice.

I had visions of it studded with edamame in my head, the colors making a cool contrast between the black and green.

Because picking your meals based on their color combinations is obviously normal. 

I was apparently under some major delusions thinking my crap-hole of a store would actually have black rice.

Ha. Bulgur wheat with soy chips is about as exotic as the Stop & Shop gets around here.

So that’s what I left with.

Bulgur is kind of a fun grain.

It’s chewy, but not as much as wheat berries (like in this wheatberry currant salad) or barley (like in this barley butternut squash salad) would be.

It cooks fast and has a great protein to carb ratio.

I kept the bulgur salad simple with just edamame (every damn pod shelled by hand because the Stop & Shop also doesn’t believe in pre-shelled stuff), corn and a little bit of red onion.

Honestly, this salad is  sort of made by the dressing.

Sweet fresh orange juice + dijon mustard = heaven in your mouth.

It’s bright and refreshing and complements the hearty bulgur really well.

More recipes with fresh orange juice: Orange Turkey Asian Lettuce Wraps and Spicy orange beef carnitas.

Just maybe not at 6am.

Traditionally, bulgur wheat is used in tabbouleh but I tend to swap it out for millet and make this gluten-free tabbouleh instead. Because, hey, why not?

Like This Bulgur Wheat Salad?

Try these other grain based salads too: Strawberry Tabouleh, Barley Mango Salad or Barley Kale and Cherry Salad.