Amandas Quinoa Salad Recipes

Steps:

• Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Toast almonds until crisp, lightly browned, and fragrant, about 7 minutes. Remove from oven and set aside. Meanwhile, place quinoa in a fine sieve and rinse under cold running water until the water runs clear; drain well.
• In a medium saucepan, heat 2 teaspoons olive oil over medium heat. Add yellow pepper, garlic, scallions, and red-pepper flakes; cook until the pepper is crisp-tender, about 5 minutes.
• Stir in quinoa, thyme, 1 cup water, and 1/4 teaspoon salt. Bring to a boil, reduce to a simmer, cover, and cook 7 minutes. Stir in zucchini, cover, and cook until quinoa is tender but not mushy, 5 to 8 minutes longer. Remove the saucepan from heat.
• Stir in celery, almonds, and remaining 2 teaspoons oil, season with salt, and fluff with a fork. Cool to room temperature before packing into 2 containers and refrigerating. When ready to eat, squeeze lime over salad, if desired. Serve with additional lime wedge and thyme, if desired.

Steps:

• Wash quinoa in 3 changes of cold water in a bowl, draining in a fine-mesh sieve. Cook quinoa in a medium pot of well-salted boiling water, uncovered, until almost tender, about 10 minutes. Drain in sieve, then set sieve over same pot above 1 inch of simmering water (water should not touch bottom of sieve). Cover quinoa with a folded kitchen towel (not terry cloth), then cover with a lid (don't worry if lid doesn't fit tightly) and steam until tender, fluffy, and dry, about 15 minutes. Let stand off heat, without lid but still covered with towel, 5 minutes.
• Meanwhile, soak onion in a bowl of cold water 5 minutes, then drain well and pat very dry.
• Trim ends of hearts of palm, then cut crosswise into very thin slices with slicer.
• Whisk together vinegar, oil, 1/2 teaspoon salt, and 1/4 teaspoon pepper in a large bowl. Toss quinoa, onion, hearts of palm, and parsley with dressing.
• What to drink:
• Concha y Torro Terrunyo Casablanca Valley Sauvignon Blanc '07

Steps:

• Heat quinoa, water and salt to boiling in 2-quart saucepan, stirring once or twice; reduce heat to low. Cover and simmer 12 to 15 minutes or until tender.
• Remove saucepan from heat; let stand 5 minutes. Fluff quinoa with fork; cool 15 minutes.
• In small bowl, beat all vinaigrette ingredients with whisk.
• Mix vinaigrette, quinoa and remaining salad ingredients in large bowl. Serve warm, or cover and refrigerate about 4 hours or until chilled.