Honey-Lime-Tajin Salad with Black Beans, Corn, and Cauliflower

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Honey-Lime-Tajin Salad with Black Beans, Corn, and Cauliflower

Jump To Sections In This Article: Why I Love This Recipe What Makes This a Great Meal Prep Option Why is This Recipe Good for Weight-Loss? Ingredient Spotlight: Tajin Seasoning Blend Variations What to Do If I Need Help with My Weight Loss The Recipe

Why I Love This Recipe

I’m a little bit obsessed with bean salads.

Why, you may ask? Well, I feel like they were the lifeline I needed during a difficult time.

I’ve been maintaining my 100 lb weight-loss since 2018, and I did a lot of work to banish emotional eating from my vocabulary (and my behavior) in order to accomplish that. But in the summer of 2024, I was seeing a very frustrating resurgence of that behavior! Especially during the evening “witching hour” of dessert (which would lead to another dessert, then another, then ANOTHER…

But the humble bean salad saved me. I realized that I could set myself up for more success if I had my dessert in the afternoon (right after my high-protein afternoon snack), and enjoyed something less bottomless during the nighttime witching hour. Something that had lots of nutrients, that would keep me full, that wouldn’t have me going back for more cookies and more cookies and more cookies…

So every weekend, without fail, I’d prep a really delicious and zippy bean salad. It had to have a killer dressing, and some really good mix-ins. That way, I still looked forward to it and enjoyed it, but I didn’t open the floodgates of evening sugar-rushes.”

That’s how bean salads saved me!

Why This Works Great for Meal Prep

Bean salads are the best way to have a plant-based side-dish that stays delicious all week! If you make this on Sunday, it’ll taste even better by Thursday (unlike the green leafy salads that get wilty, soggy, or brown by that time.) You get all the nutritious of a leafy salad, but with none of the sad wet slop.

Also, this salad has a lime-juice-based dressing. And according to Jillian Smith, RDN, lead registered dietitian for GutPersonal, “the citric acid in the juice helps inhibit enzymatic browning” of the fresh produce by reducing its exposure to oxygen.

So, between the hearty beans, roasted cauliflower, and citrus in the dressing, this is a salad that was MADE for meal-prep.

Why is This Recipe Good for Weight-Loss?

When it comes to managing your weight, it’s all about predictability.

If you know the calorie content of your meals, snacks, and treats, you can easily build a few weekly plans that adhere to a calorie deficit, and boom. You’ll be losing fat steadily over time.

But in the modern world, predictability with meals is extremely hard to come by. Our work and other responsibilities constantly overruns our schedules, leaving very little time for creating 3 predictable homemade meals a day. That means we are heavily reliant on things that are already made for us. We order salads from the deli for lunch, we grab pizza or Chinese for dinner, we get starving at work so we eat the donuts in the breakroom or the chocolate in the client gift-basket. Before you know it, you have NO CLUE whether you’ve hit a calorie deficit, or you’ve just had a weight-gain week.

So, being able to make a fast batch of something, in a single bowl, that creates basically 8 snacks or dinner sides at once, and we know that it has exactly 192 calories in each serving? The value of this kind of meal is huge to your weight-loss efforts.

Ingredient Spotlight: Tajin Seasoning Blend

If you’ve never tried this commonly available item, this is a very exciting time for you! Once you get it, it just might be the best spice in your pantry. [Read more about this seasoning here].

Most people describe this seasoning as a salty, citrusy, and zingy blend of flavors that pop on the tongue (figuratively). It’s traditionally used to enhance fresh fruits and vegetables such as pineapple, melon, mango, and cucumbers. But it’s astounding how many different foods you can use this on! Some of my favorite uses: as a rim on a citrusy cocktail, on top of a fruit salad, as an ingredient in roasted nuts, on Mexican street corn, on pizza, or even with a mixture of melted butter and honey (I call this a honey butter tajin glaze).

Variations

This bean salad is pretty flexible, based on the fresh ingredients you have on hand.

Swap the veggie.
Don’t have cauliflower? No problem. Try diced zucchini, green bell peppers, green beans, or even sweet potatoes. Just cut your veg to similar sizes so they roast evenly, and keep the seasoning the same.

Switch up the beans.
Black beans are my favorite match-up for honey, lime, and tajin. But this works with kidney beans, chickpeas, or white beans. You could also add edamame—just be sure to combine it with at least 1 can of a different type of bean, because an all-edamame salad wouldn’t be very exciting, texture-wise.

Top it with extras
Add some additional ingredients to take this over the top. My favorites are chopped fresh cilantro, diced avocado, fresh diced tomato, pico de gallo, pickled jalapenos, crumbled cotija cheese, or even toasted walnuts.

How Else Can I Support My Weight Loss Goal?

You can stay in my circle! My name is Megan Gaul. I’m an online wellness coach specializing in weight loss and food freedom. My 100-lb weight loss journey, which began in 2018 here in Staten Island, New York (I’ve been maintaining my healthy weight range since then), was the catalyst I needed to start my coaching career in 2021. I have a number of resources that can help you:

• Grab your free Journey-Day-1 coaching call: Book Now
• Attend live Meal Planning classes every week, taught by yours-truly (join free here)
• Enroll in your 1-1 coaching program to get out of your negative cycle and actually lose weight for good: Learn More
• Follow my Instagram for more recipes and strategies, and all about Messy Life after Losing 100 lbs (find me at @partake_foodie)

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Honey-Lime-Tajin Salad with Black Beans, Corn, and Cauliflower

Yield: 8

Author: Megan Gaul from Partake Meal Planning

Prep time: 10 MinCook time: 25 MinTotal time: 35 Min

A gorgeous cold summer salad with no green leaves in sight, perfect for backyard BBQs or an easy dinner-side at home. It's bursting with fresh sweet corn and hearty black beans, and its drenched in a zingy dressing made with olive oil, lime juice, honey, and a powerhouse seasoning blend called Tajin. Summer means flavor!

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Ingredients

The Cauliflower

• 1/2 a small head of cauliflower (around 10 oz)
• 1/2 a tbsp (~7 g) olive oil
• 1/2 tsp kosher salt
• 1/2 tsp black pepper

The Dressing

• 1 1/2 tablespoons (~18 g) olive oil
• 1 generous tablespoon (20-25 g) honey
• 1 lime, zested and juiced (this should yield around 2 tsp of zest and 40-50 ml lime juice)
• 2 tsp tajin seasoning blend (or more to taste)
• 1 tsp kosher salt
• 1 tsp black pepper

The Salad

• 2 cans black beans, drained
• 2 ears fresh corn, kernels cut off the cob
• 1/2 a red or yellow onion (around 100 g), finely diced

Instructions

1. Make the Roasted Cauliflower: Preheat your oven to 425 F and line a small sheet-pan with parchment paper. Finely chop the cauliflower into bite-size pieces - the pieces should be small enough so that you can scoop them onto a fork easily. Toss together the cauliflower, 1/2 tbsp olive oil, and 1/2 tsp each kosher salt and black pepper. Once the oven is at temp, arrange the cauliflower in a single layer on the lined sheet pan and roast it until it's soft and tender with little browned or caramlized edges (around 20-30 min. Start checking at the 20-minute mark).
2. Make the Dressing: While the cauliflower is roasting, you can continue the recipe. Combine the dressing ingredients in the bottom of your serving bowl and whisk thoroughly until smooth.
3. Make the Salad: Combine the drained black beans, the corn, and the onion in the serving bowl that contains the dressing. Toss until the salad is thoroughly coated.
4. Finish and Serve: Once the cauliflower is out of the oven, you can let it cool slightly. Then, add it to the salad and toss once again. Taste and adjust seasoning. You can do this by adding more salt, pepper, tajin, or lime if it's missing zippiness, or by adding more olive oil if it's too acidic or needs more mellowness/unctuousness.
5. Optional extra toppings: chopped fresh cilantro, diced avocado, fresh diced tomato, pico de gallo, pickled jalapenos, crumbled cotija cheese, or even toasted walnuts.

Nutrition Facts

Calories

192

Fat

4 g

Sat. Fat

1 g

Carbs

30 g

Fiber

7 g

Net carbs

23 g

Sugar

5 g

Protein

9 g

Sodium

896 mg

Cholesterol

0 mg

This wepbage provides approximate nutrition information for convenience and as a courtesy only. Nutrition data is gathered primarily from the USDA Food Composition Database, whenever available, or otherwise other online nutrition data from manufacturer and food retailer websites. By accessing or using this recipe, you are acknowledging and agreeing to the full nutrition information disclaimer for this website, which you can read in its entirety here.