Two weeks ago, we featured quick, simple, and delicious ways to enjoy cheese with our favorite fall cheese toast ideas. Today, we’re exploring another go-to strategy for incorporating quality cheese into our seasonal cooking: ideas for balanced, flavorful bowls you can reach for any time of day. 

We love bowls like this because one session of prepping—cooking grains or legumes, roasting or sauteing veggies, chopping garnishes—gives you the foundation for several fast, fresh meals. They’re also a solid strategy for reducing food waste and make excellent fridge cleanout meals. For the finishing touch, top them with cheese from your Grotto. 

You can mix and match to create variety, too: tired of rice or lentils? Just about any of these recipes could be served over salad greens to change things up a bit. These are some of our favorite autumnal bowl recipes that you can enjoy for breakfast, lunch, or dinner. 

Healthy Fall Breakfast Bowl Ideas

Okay, a bowl of just about anything savory can qualify as breakfast if you put an egg on it. We love to start with a base of rice—white, brown, whatever you have on hand. We also love the dramatic look and nutty flavor of black rice as a base for fall flavors. 

First, top a bowl of that antioxidant-packed black rice with cubes of sweet potato and rounds of delicata squash. We love this variety not only for its sweet, nutty flavor, but because its colorful, tender skin requires no peeling—just seed, slice, and roast. Then crumble on smooth, tangy fresh chevre and finish with fragrant sprigs of Thai basil. Dollops of fresh ricotta or shavings of ricotta salata would also work great—learn how to make it yourself at our next virtual cheesemaking class!

Healthy Fall Lunch Bowl Ideas

The lunch recipes we return to over and over have one thing in common: they’re incredibly quick and intuitive to put together. All you need to have a filling, nutritious, and craveable lunch waiting for you each day is prep a batch of green lentils. 

We like to top this versatile base with shavings of Parmigiano-Reggiano and fresh basil leaves, finished with a drizzle of good balsamic vinegar. But there are so many ways to tweak this basic formula with whatever you have on hand: swap in crumbled chevre and baby arugula with extra-virgin olive oil, or cubes of feta and baby spinach made zingy with a lemony vinaigrette.

Healthy Fall Dinner Bowl Ideas

For something a little more substantial for the evening meal, we love legumes. They’re incredibly tasty, versatile, and nutritious, plus they make a filling base for when you’re eating no (or less) meat. 

One of our favorite ways to combine tender white beans and cheese takes inspiration from the bold flavors of a cheese and charcuterie board, crossed with fall standbys like sweet potato and braised kale. Choose a rich, piquant blue cheese and your favorite salami—Olli is a go-to brand in our kitchen. Top the whole thing with a poached, fried, or soft-boiled egg to pump up the protein even more. 

You can also incorporate fall veggies into flavorful sauces to dress up a bowl. Rather than serving sliced or cubed beets over quinoa and black rice with sweet potato and goat cheese, we buzz them into a vivid dressing that’s sweet, bright, and earthy. You can switch things up with slices of soft-ripened goat cheese crottin in place of the usual chevre. 

It’s a great way to highlight bloomy cheeses like Cloud Nine or Black Diamond from Yellow Springs Farm or blue-tinged Mountain Top from Firefly Farms. (You can even make your own!) The result is a colorful, flavorful, and balanced bowl you’ll want to eat every night of the week. 

What’s your approach to balanced, delicious home cooking in the fall? Let us know!