A farewell, a guest post and a super salad

Greetings!

Today is the day - the one where I am finally reunited with one of my favourite dishes. After all this time, a dish that I haven't made myself in a vain attempt to recreate a million moments I miss very much.

HUZZAH!

And while I'm gone, you may be bereft of my posting presence. Devastating, no? A whole week. Well in order to keep you from throwing yourselves in the pits of despair, I have gone and found you a replacement. Stylish gal, blogger extraordinaire, champagne-lover and excellent friend... none other than my (yes, real life) neighbour, Nikki of Styling You.

She made me this salad last week and I proposed marriage.

***

We're very much a barbecueing kind of family at this time of year. Love keeping the heat out of the kitchen, so to speak.

And I love a good salad.

Not just a toss some lettuce, tomato and cucumber in a bowl type of salad. No, I like my salads with a twist. I like them to be tasty meals in themselves. I like them to be colourful and I like them to cover off a few healthy eating bases as well.

Last week I had Veggie Mama and St Murphy over for dinner and I made my quinoa, antipasto and goat's cheese salad.  Veggie Mama has been on at me to give her this recipe for like ... forever.

Now, if you're scratching your head and still back at the word quinoa, don't worry. I hadn't even heard of this super dooper grain until a weekend at a luxe health retreat almost four years ago. Now, we'd eat it at least once every week. And it's available in your local supermarket (I used to have to hunt it down at health food stores).

Jules over at The Stone Soup has the low down on why quinoa has earned its superfood status but in a nutshell, it's gluten free, low in carbohydrates and high in protein.

Yep, that adds up to one very satisfying meal ingredient.

Ingredients

2 cups quinoa

6 cups water

Handful baby spinach

Handful baby rocket

Mint, shredded (to taste)

1 Lemon, zested and juiced

1 jar of char-grilled vegetables (or grill your own), diced

4 cubes of marinated goat’s cheese

Drizzle of olive oil from goat’s cheese jar

Method

Prepare quinoa via absorption method. I use my Thermomix, you could use a rice cooker or saucepan (bring water to boil, reduce heat, cover and simmer for 15 minutes).

In large salad bowl toss baby spinach, rocket, mint, lemon zest, char-grilled vegetables or antipasto vegetables.

Add warm or cool quinoa (I like warm as I like how it melts the goat’s cheese).  Crumble in the goat’s cheese, pour on lemon juice and drizzle oil to taste and desired consistency.

Toss in bowl and serve.

Serves 8 as a side dish; 6 as a meal.

Do you cook with quinoa? Have a recipe you'd love to share? Or do you have a salad that always gets two thumbs up when you serve it up at home?

You'll find me blogging over here and on Twitter here.