The Easy Way to Lunch
For lunch, for example, quinoa is a staple when I am alone at home and I am craving protein-loaded food.
And I don't mean to be scientific about it. Others do that much better than me. Yet the truth is that my relationship with quinoa lives there too, because every time I eat quinoa, my body feels comforted and relaxed.
Nourished the right way.
So in the end, I don't need convincing that quinoa is being good to me.
When I am in a crunch time, quinoa is often my response for lunch.
The seeds (not a grain by the way) are incredibly easy to prepare: twelve minutes to cook is all it needs. I then build the rest around it, according to my time and mood.
At times, I prefer it warm, eaten plain to accompany a plate of sunny face up fried eggs with a salad of mixed greens on the side.
Or, I use it as the basis to a full-flavored salade composée.
Yesterday, as I walked into the kitchen with a hungry belly after a morning spent in the garden to plant, I looked for a quick solution for lunch. I had a bowl of blanched fava beans kept for another cooking project, and local asparagus bought the afternoon before. Quinoa, I knew, would be fast to prepare.
There, I saw the promise of a spring-like salad.
A nutritious one-in-all salad for lunch.
That's where it started.
And the next day, I repeated it.
Because it left me exactly as anticipated.
Happy and fullfilled.
Quinoa Salad--Lunch for One
You need:- Olive oil
- 4 green purple green asparagus, sliced
- 1 garlic clove, finely minced
- Sea salt and pepper
- 1 tablespoon lemon Juice (from 1/2 lemon)
- 1 teaspoon tahini
- 1 teaspoon chopped chives
- 1 teaspoon chopped parsley
- 1 cup (160 g) cooked quinoa
- 1/3 cup (60 g) blanched and peeled** fava beans
- 1 punces (30 g) red grapes, halved
- 1 orange, peeled and sliced in fine membranes (without the white skin)
- 3 pink radishes, finely sliced with a mandoline
- 1 ounce crumbled fresh soft goat cheese
- A few radish shoots (I used some from my garden) or micro greens
- In a frying pan, heat 1 tablespoon olive oil over medium heat. When warm, add the asparagus. Cook for 1 minute, stirring.
- Add the garlic and cook for one more minute--the asparagus need to stay crunchy. Transfer to a bowl and leave to cool. Season with salt and pepper; set aside.
- In a small bowl, whisk together the lemon juice and tahini. Season with salt and pepper.
- Add 3 tablespoons olive oil and whisk to emulsify. Add 3/4 of the mixed herbs and set aside.
- To assemble the salad, in a bowl, toss together the quinoa, fava beans, and asparagus. Add the grapes, orange, radishes, goat cheese.
- Toss gently with the dressing.
- Transfer to a plate and finish with extra fresh herbs and radish shoots.
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