Kaki!  This is what I made to go along with that Tofu in White Wine Butter Sauce.  Not that it was my idea; both recipes are from The Flexitarian Table by Peter Berley.  I dig* that cookbook; it’s organized by season and then organized by suggested menus, which are then each preceded by a suggested order of preparation (start by making the marinade, then set the chicken to marinade, then start the rice on the stove, then…).  Plus the whole schtick of the cookbook is that each entree can be easily made for either meat-eaters or vegetarians.  As in, divide the marinade between two dishes, and in one dish marinade some chicken, and in another marinade some tofu.  Freakin’ brilliant; this is how people eat now!**

So, recipe origins aside, um, who doesn’t love a good quinoa salad?

No one.

Summer Quinoa Salad

serves 4

adapted from The Flexitarian Table by Peter Berley

Ingredients

• 1 cup red quinoa, rinsed in a fine-mesh strainer until water runs clear
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 2 cups water
• 2 ears corn, shucked
• 8 ounces sugar snap peas***, cut into roughly 1/2″ pieces
• 1 cup cherry tomatoes, halved
• 1/4 cup olive oil
• 2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice
• salt and pepper, to taste
• 1/4 cup pumpkin seeds, toasted (in a dry pan over medium heat for a few minutes, tossing occasionally to keep from burning)
• 1/2 cup fresh flat-leaf parsley, chopped

Add quinoa, salt, and water to a small pot with a lid.  Place on the stove, covered, and bring to a boil.  Turn the heat down slightly and simmer until water is absorbed, about 15 minutes.  Quickly give it a stir to check that most of the water is absorbed, then re-cover the pot and remove from the heat, letting the quinoa steam for another 5 minutes.  (If much of the water hasn’t been absorbed, let simmer for a few minutes longer before removing from the heat to steam.)

Pour the cooked quinoa out onto a plate or baking sheet to cool.

Place one shucked ear of corn in a large bowl, holding upright.  Using a large knife, cut the corn off of the cob in vertical strips; the bowl will catch the kernels.  Repeat with the second ear.

Add the sugar snap peas, cherry tomatoes, and cooled quinoa to the bowl with the corn.  Add the olive oil and lemon juice, tossing to combine.  Taste and add salt and pepper as desired.

Just before serving, add the toasted pumpkin seeds and the chopped parsley, tossing to combine.

This of course is incredibly flexible.  The original recipe calls for blanched green beans instead of sugar snap peas, and a slew of other vegetables would work great here.  Steamed edamame?  Cucumber?  Bell pepper?  Carrots?  Shredded collard greens or cabbage?  Avocado!? Yes to all.

Miss you, my dear, hope you’re doing well!

-Caitlin

*Do people still say “dig”?  I feel like no.

**Also, I apparently really dig semi-colons and italics.  More than normal.

***Kaki.  Sugar. Snap. Peas.  God I love them so much.

P.S.  I’ve found a new food blog that I absolutely adore:  Poor Man’s Feast.  I haven’t tried any of the recipes yet, but that’s really not the point: Kaki, Kaki this woman writes so freakin’ well.  The voice, the structure, the restrained use of cultural references that still make me go, “I know what that means!!”  The Jewish references that I kind of barely get, the family flashbacks that everyone can get, the food-is-defining-in-celebrations-and-sorrows-and-in-simple-everyday-life-moments element that has me smiling and aching through each post.  I cannot recommend enough that you read a few entries.