Date Night Dinners - Quinoa Salad
This week we went for something light and healthy which was great (and to my surprise Brenden's idea; crazy right). My parents went to Philly for the day and of course I requested they bring back some authentic Philly cheesesteak subs. And to my pleasure they delivered giant and delicious subs with just the right amount of meat and cheese, perfectly cooked and blended on a roll. Yumm, maybe I should have asked for two. It's okay, the sub was so big it will last a few days (for me that is, Brenden's is gone). Anyway, my point is after eating this gigantic oily (delicious don't get me wrong) mess we wanted a smaller dinner to compliment our previous meals.
My first thought was potatoes. There is this recipe I've been dying to try where you bake and broil the potatoes after smothering them with butter, garlic and cheese. Sounds good, right? But like I said, Brenden was itching to do something else and who am I to say no the one time Brenden wants something involving vegetables and "salad." He was craving quinoa so we looked for a good sounding recipe. We found a few that sounded appealing. Now the problem was that each had something we didn't have at home, and we were both too exhausted to go to the store. So we picked a base recipe and mixed and matched and subsituted. And, it turned out pretty well.
We used corn instead of black beans, red onion instead of green, and added bell peppers to the mix. All good, what's to go wrong? Exactly, nothing! We pretty much stuck to the recipe for the dressing and while it was alright, we will probably be making some adjustments during round two. It used A LOT of cumin, and don't get me wrong I LOVE cumin, as much as the next person, but it was a bit overwhelming (not in the sense that it wasn't edible, but it was pretty much all you could taste in the dressing. So, after gobbling up all the quinoa salad, we decided we would put a little less cumin in and a bit more citrus next time. But besides that, it was a pretty spot on meal - easy and tasty. And it was pretty, too with all the vibrant colors.
Summer Quinoa Salad
Recipe adapted from allrecipes.com, Zesty Quinoa Salad
Ingredients
- 1 cup quinoa, uncooked
- 2 cups water
- 1/4 cup extra virgin olive oil
- Juice of two limes
- 2 tsp ground quinoa
- 1/2 tsp red pepper flakes
- 1.5 cups cherry tomatoes, halved
- 1-15oz can corn, drained and rinsed
- 1 cup red onion, chopped
- salt and pepper to taste
- Bring quinoa and water to a boil in a saucepan.
- Reduce heat to medium-low, cover, and simmer until quinoa is tender and water has been absorbed, 10 to 15 minutes.
- Set aside to cool.
- Whisk olive oil, lime juice, cumin, 1 teaspoon salt, and red pepper flakes together in a small bowl.
- Combine quinoa, tomatoes, corn, and red onion together in a large bowl.
- Pour dressing over quinoa mixture and toss to coat.
- Season with salt and pepper to taste.
- Serve immediately or chill in refrigerator for a cold salad.
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