Quinoa Salad

What started as solid food for my baby turned out to be an action packed bollywoody food for the both of us. Bollywood I say, because there is so much masala and lots of things to make it zingy!

Quinoa (prononced kinwaa) needs no introduction. It's one of the healthiest grain in the entire world, an all-rounder in nutrition. It's a good source of calcium, iron, magnesium and more importantly, it's gluten free. In layman terms it's a yummy tummy treat.

I included this as a part of my son's diet mainly because it's gluten free and it's packed with all the necessary nutritional quotient that it instantly ticked all my check boxes!

The only drawback is that it's not readily available in your regular departmental store and hence you will need to source this from an upscale high end supermarket. However I found this online at "zansaar.com" which has thankfully eliminated my travel time by bringing this to me to my doorstep. I use Roland white quinoa and a packet (340 gms) is priced at Rs.430 (quite expensive I must say). But considering everything that I have written above I've decided to ignore the price.

There are a lot of recipes to try out but today I am sharing this very simple salad. It's so simple, yummy and at the same time very healthy. So I am not complaining.

Ingredients:

Cooking quinoa:
Quinoa - 1cup
Water - 2cups
Salt - 1/4tsp

Add salt to the two cups of water and put it on boil. Once it starts to boil, add 1 cup of quinoa and stir in. Cook it till the entire water is evaporated which takes about 15 - 18 mins. Once done, keep this aside. 1 cup of quinoa yields 2 - 3 cups when cooked.

For the salad:
3 cups quinoa (procedure above)
Olive oil - 2 tbsp
Peanuts - 1tbsp
Onion - 1 finely chopped
Tomato - 1 finely chopped

Parboil the below:
Carrot - 2 finely diced
Potato - 1 finely diced
Pumpkin - small piece finely diced
Celery - 1 finely chopped
Dill leaves - a bunch chopped finely
Coriander leaves - a bunch
Green chillies - 1tsp
Ginger - 1tsp
Chickpeas or any other legumes (rajma, moth-gram etc) - 1 cup cooked
Salt to taste
Turmeric - 1tsp
Red Chilli powder - 1tsp
Chat masala - 1tsp
Juice of one lemon

Procedure:
1. In a wok heat up olive oil, add in peanuts and ginger, sauté a bit and then add onions and celery. Sauté this till onions become translucent. Now add tomatoes and green chillies and sauté till it blends in.

2. Add in the parboiled vegetables, sauté for a minute and then add the legumes.

3. Now add in the quinoa and all the masalas and give it a fine stir. Finally add in the dill leaves and lemon juice and give it a quick mix.

4. Finally garnish with coriander and serve.

This will guarantee you a guilt-free and a yummy indulgence!