Grain bowl recipes are so delicious, nutritious and easy! Just layer in a cooked grain, then top with your favorite plant proteins, veggies, and dressing. Yum! This burrito millet grain bowl features the gluten-free ancient grain millet at its base.
What is millet?
With a mild taste, light nutty texture, and creamy color, millet is the perfect foundation grain bowls. Packed with flavorful ingredients, including refried beans, lettuce, corn, cucumbers, avocado, green onions, tomatoes, carrots, pumpkin seeds, cilantro, and salsa, this millet bowl is packed with nutrition. Did you know that millet cooks up quickly? In fact, you can get this whole recipe done in under 30 minutes. It’s also the perfect burrito bowl meal prep recipe—package up four bowls in individual containers to tote along to work or enjoy for quick healthy meals during the week. Packed with taste, crunch, and color, this burrito bowl relies upon budget-friendly ingredients you probably have on hand right now! I love to serve this bowl recipe for friends and family; I just prep all of the ingredients and let everyone make their own bowl meal just the way they like it. So pretty, too! And feel free to swap out for your favorite ingredients in this recipe—try adding crumbled tempeh bacon, sliced red cabbage, and sunflower seeds, for example. This recipe is gluten-free and vegan.
How to Cook Millet
First cultivated about 10,000 years ago in Asia and Africa, millet quickly became a food staple around the world. The Bible refers to it in bread making, the Romans ate it as porridge, and it was the prevalent grain in China before rice. Many countries’ cuisines include millet, such as flatbreads in India (roti and bhakri), porridges, and even beer and wine. Today, we are starting to appreciate millet as a versatile whole grain, which can be cooked up in 20 minutes. With their tiny, crunchy golden grains, millet has a mild flavor that suits many dishes. It’s a great idea to include more fiber rich whole grains like millet in your diet for multiple health advantages, including heart health, healthy weight, and lower risk of type 2 diabetes. Learn more about whole grain health benefits here.
Nutrition Notes
A cup of cooked millet contains 12% of the Daily Value each of satiating protein and the B vitamins thiamin and niacin, which support metabolism. Millet is also rich in polyphenols, powerful health-promoting plant compounds. Is millet gluten-free? Yes, this grain is completely gluten-free, so it’s a perfect option for everyone at your table. Combined with the beans, vegetables, and salsa in this grain bowl recipe, you’ll get a good dose of protein, vitamins A and E, slow-digesting carbs, fiber, potassium, and phytonutrients that act as antioxidant and anti-inflammatory compounds.
Description
This super quick and easy Burrito Millet Grain Bowl recipe is packed with nutrition and flavor. Gluten-free and vegan, you can get four millet bowls ready in under 30 minutes, making it great for meal prep.
Millet:
- 1 cup millet, uncooked
- 2 cups water
Toppings:
- 1 (15-ounce) can vegetarian refried beans (or 1 ¾ cups; make your own refried beans here)
- 2 cups chopped lettuce (i.e., romaine, oak leaf, iceberg)
- 1 cup frozen corn, thawed (may use canned, drained or fresh, cooked, and shucked)
- 1 cup cherry tomatoes (any color), cut in half
- 2 small Armenian cucumbers, unpeeled, sliced
- 1 large avocado, peeled, sliced
- 1 cup shredded carrots
- ½ cup chopped fresh cilantro
- 2 stalks green onions, sliced
- 2 tablespoons pumpkin seeds, shelled
- 1 lemon or lime, sliced
Sauces:
- 1/2 cup prepared salsa (or make this classic salsa here)
- 1/2 cup vegan sour cream, optional (or make your own here)
- Bring water to boil over medium heat in a small pot. Add millet, stir, return to boil, reduce heat to a simmer, and cook until tender (about 20 minutes).
- Drain any remaining water from millet and fluff with a fork. Set aside.
- While millet is cooking, assemble toppings and sauces.
- Heat the refried beans in the microwave or over the stove. Set aside.
- Select large individual bowls (or meal prep containers) that accommodate 3 cups. Arrange the following into each bowl:
- ½ cup cooked millet
- 1/3 cup refried beans
- 1/3 cup chopped lettuce
- ¼ cup corn
- ¼ cup cherry tomatoes
- ½ sliced cucumber
- ¼ sliced avocado
- ¼ cup shredded carrots
- 2 tablespoons chopped cilantro
- 1-2 tablespoons chopped green onion
- ½ tablespoon pumpkin seeds
- 1-2 lemon or lime slices
- 2 tablespoons salsa
- 2 tablespoons vegan sour cream (optional)
- Serve immediately. Makes 4 servings (one 3-cup bowl each). If you are going to serve this for meal prep, dish up sauces on the side and add right before serving. Store in airtight containers for up to 5 days.
Notes
I like to serve this grain bowl in one of these pretty ceramic bowls here.
Additional toppings include the following:
- Plant-based cheese
- Jalapeno peppers
- Sunflower seeds
- Sliced black olives
- Shaved red or green cabbage
- Spicy vegan ranch dressing
- Prep Time: 15 minutes
- Cook Time: 20 minutes
- Category: Entree
- Cuisine: American
Check out some of my other favorite grain bowl recipes:
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