Meatless Monday - Roast vegetable and quinoa salad

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I cannot believe how much I love quinoa. I'm usually scared of weird grainy type things, and I've had a real aversion to barley like, my whole life. I'm so glad I gave this a try, it has honestly made my quite-frequent salads just that little bit different. The fact that it's so healthy and packed with goodness is the best bonus of all.

Given my fear of grains, cous cous and I have never been friends. All the ideas I have for cous cous kinds of recipes are given a new lease on life with quinoa. It's never let me down.

For this, I boiled 1 cup of quinoa in two cups of water, simmered about 20 minutes, and left it to absorb whatever might be left and cool down a bit. It made a lot of salad for one girl, so I ended up making burgers from the remaining half I didn't eat. Recipe will be coming soon!

Ingredients:

2-3 cups cooked quinoa

100g feta, cubed

1 zucchini, diced

1 tomato, diced

1 red onion, peeled and cut into wedges

1/2 red capsicum, chopped

handful fresh basil, torn

pinch each sugar, salt and pepper

1/4 cup red wine vinegar

1/4 cup olive oil

Directions:

1. Roast the tomato, zucchini and onion in a slow oven until just tender.

2. Mix the quinoa, veggies and feta. Add the sugar, salt and pepper (you might want to add more salt, I added quite a bit according to taste).

3. Stir through basil and red wine vinegar. Then add olive oil (in my head this means the vinegar will soak into the grains for better flavour without the grains first being coated by oil. I've no idea if this is even true!)

Linky bitz...

♥ The linky will be up every Monday morning, and will stay up until the following Sunday. It doesn't matter if you eat your meal on a day other than Monday - it's just an easy day to create the link.

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Where it says "Name", you might like to add the name of your dish instead or as well.

*I have been meaning to investigate thumbnail links for this party, but it kept getting relegated down the to-do list. Anyway, reader RaNae asked last week if I'd considered it so I've upgraded my membership and voila! We have pictures! Thanks for that RaNae xx

Quinoa Tabouli - my morning sickness food

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I have to say, with my general lack of appetite and many food avoidances, I've really been loving anything cold and kind of sharp. Very much enjoying cold fruit, fruit juice, and anything with vinegar or lemon.

While re-reading You Having a Baby by Dr Oz and Dr Roizen (didn't I just read this a few months ago? sheesh) I came across their recipe for quinoa tabouli. Now I LOVE tabouli, and have recently become a fan of quinoa. The two together sounded exactly like what I needed.

I made a huge bowl and ate it for the next two days straight. In fact, my mouth is watering and I need this desperately, but I'm out of quinoa. Damn. Normally I'm used to a ton of parsely in my tabouli - in fact, the main ingredient. I thought I'd be sad but the balance here is actually quite good.

It apparently makes 7 1/2 cup servings.

Ingredients

1/2 cup bulgur

1/3 cup cold water

1/3 cup fresh lemon juice

1/4 cup extra virgin olive oil, divided

1 cup cooked organic quinoa

1  cup diced tomato

1 cup cucumber, unpeeled, seeded, finely diced

1/2 cup fresh parsley, chopped

1/4 cup chopped fresh mint leaves

1/4 cup finely diced red onion

1 tsp minced garlic

1/2 tsp salt

1/2 tsp freshly ground black pepper

Directions:

1. In a large bowl, combine bulgur, water, lemon juice and 2 tablespoons of the olive oil; mix well.

2. Let stand for 30 minutes or until most of the liquid is absorbed.

3. Stir in remaining 2 tablespoons olive oil and remaining ingredients, let stand 10 minutes to allow flavours to develop.

What's in it for you and your baby

Calories: 122  Total fat: 8g  Aging (saturated and trans) fats: 1g  Healthy fats: 7g  Omega-3 fats: 0g

EPA and DHA: 0g  Fibre: 2g  Carbohydrates: 11g  Sugars: 1g  Protein: 2g  Sodium: 165mg  

Potassium: 176mg  Calcium: 24mg  Magnesium: 29mg  Selenium: 1mcg

Drool.