Vegan

Warm Quinoa and Arugula Salad with Lemon Dressing

May 3, 2013 by Erica

Warm Quinoa and Arugula Salad with Lemon Dressing

Hello, beautiful.

Warm Quinoa and Arugula Salad with Lemon Dressing

You should know that I’ve been wanting to post about this salad for a looong time. Ever since I started this blog, in fact. It’s a copycat of my favorite salad at (probably) my favorite restaurant in Salt Lake, Caffe Niche. But every time I’ve made it, it hasn’t quite lived up to the restaurant version, and I had to get it juuust right. But I think I finally did!

Warm Quinoa and Arugula Salad with Lemon Dressing

Warm red quinoa, roasted tomatoes and onions, and lemon dressing served over a bed of arugula. It is just as good as it sounds – the nutty flavor of the quinoa, the sweetness of the roasted vegetables, and the bite of the lemon and arugula all combine to make my perfect salad.

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Thai-Inspired Fruit Salad with Lime and Thai Basil

May 1, 2013 by Erica

Thai-Inspired Fruit Salad with Lime and Thai Basil

Happy May!

I think this fruit salad is the perfect way to start off such a glorious month.

Fruit salad just screams “summer barbecue” to me. It doesn’t make an appearance unless you have warm weather, a grill, and enough friends present to make a dent in a huge bowl of fruit. Yep, it doesn’t get much better the kind of occasion that features fruit salad.

But I’m not a fan of what I’ve come to think of as the typical fruit salad: pineapple, melon, and grapes. Maybe I’ve eaten too many continental breakfasts, but that just does not appeal to me. It always seems to sit out too long, the pineapple is all sour and hard, and does anyone actually like the melon in that salad? If so, the world – or at least hotel breakfast buffets – needs more people like you. And fewer people like me, who pick out all the grapes for themselves.

So instead, I created this Thai-inspired fruit salad featuring my favorite spring and summer flavors. No melon required.

Thai-Inspired Fruit Salad with Lime and Thai Basil

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Roasted Carrot and Chickpea Salad with Miso Ginger Dressing

April 29, 2013 by Erica

Roasted Carrot and Chickpea Salad with Miso Ginger Dressing

Sometimes doing the same thing over and over again is a bad thing. It’s called getting stuck in a rut.

But sometimes doing the same thing over and over again is a good thing. You’re hitting your stride. Perfecting the art. Getting it down to a science.

What I just learned from writing those sentences is that sports, art and science all involve doing the same thing over and over again. And I often feel like cooking is all three of those things! Definitely art. Definitely science. If you’re skeptical about the sports bit, you should see the sweat I can work up trying to get three dishes ready at the same time. It probably counts as my workout for the day, right? I thought so.

Roasted Carrot and Chickpea Salad with Miso Ginger Dressing

I guess what I’m trying to say is that I’ve been roasting a lot of vegetables lately. I’ve put them in tacos, I’ve had them on lentils, I’ve eaten them as sushi, I’ve called them poutine. April has kind of been The Month of the Roasted Vegetables around here. Stride = hit. Art = perfected. Science = …gotten down to? Sure. All of those things.

And so, just as the weather is getting warm enough here in Salt Lake that I’m not sure how much longer I’ll be wanting to turn my oven on, here is another roasted vegetable recipe. And it’s a really good one, too, this time over kale for Dole National Salad Day on Wednesday.

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Roasted Veggie Lentil Bowl with Charred Red Pepper Sauce

April 12, 2013 by Erica

Roasted Veggie Lentil Bowl with Charred Red Pepper Sauce

Well, I think I can say that I’m a changed woman.

After just a brief period of cooking with strictly what I have in the house, my creative juices are starting to flow. It really wasn’t that difficult, either. Granted my “pantry cleanse” has turned into more of a fridge cleanse, but that’s OK. I’m realizing that both are a great source of inspiration for new recipes, and I’m getting more comfortable throwing things together without knowing how they’ll turn out. Not everything is blog worthy, that’s for sure, but nothing has turned out too badly, either. I know it comes as second nature to some, but for this type A planner, this is a light bulb moment!

So I’ll chalk up a win in the creativity column, but unfortunately, my cabinets still merit hoarder status. While I’ve used a lot of pantry items that had been languishing for a while, I haven’t necessarily used up any of them. And so it continues…

Roasted Veggie Lentil Bowl with Charred Red Pepper Sauce

My go-to dish during this effort has been a big bowl of roasted veggie goodness, like Wednesday’s sushi bowls: Some sort of grain + roasted veggies + sauce or dressing + a little extra flavor on top. Here I picked lentils instead of a grain for some extra protein, especially because I was already using starchy potatoes. Also, you saw in Monday’s post that I have a ton of legumes, so I had to use at least one kind this week! I realized afterwards that this dish is actually pretty close to my cauliflower steaks with lentils and this same sauce. This time, though, I only had half a pepper to use in the sauce, and successfully resisted the urge to run to the grocery store to grab another one. I also had most of a big can of tomato puree that I wanted to use up, so I just threw it all in. Despite those changes, the sauce was just as good as I remembered; I honestly couldn’t even tell the difference with less pepper and more tomato. Veeeeery flexible – I like it.

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Spelt Berry Sushi Bowl with Roasted Cauliflower

April 10, 2013 by Erica

Spelt Berry Sushi Bowl

Good morning and happy Wednesday!

I wouldn’t be so chipper (I feel morning chipperness is generally uncalled-for), but just look at all these colors. Food like this makes me happy to be alive.

(If you’re still half asleep and don’t feel like eating sushi yet… I apologize. I kind of have a thing for colorful food.)

Spelt Berry Sushi Bowl

In case you missed it, this is Pantry Week here at Coffee & Quinoa: a week of me attempting to simultaneously clean out my cabinets and teach myself to put a meal together without a trip to the store.

This dish is a random weeknight creation that truly belongs in my pantry series. Pawing through the fridge after work one night, I found some leftover veggies and cooked spelt, plus some cauliflower with only a few more days of life left in it. For some reason my sweet potato sushi bowl came to mind. I decided to go for it, but was pretty doubtful as I whipped up the dressing… an Asian dish with cauliflower and spelt, really?

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