Quinoa! Topping the world culinary charts as the latest Super Food!!! This one’s a real boon from heaven for gluten-free diets! Loaded with protein, this is one of the few plant foods that contain an abundance of all nine essential amino acids. Being equally high in fiber, magnesium, vitamin B & E, iron, potassium, calcium, phosphorus and various beneficial antioxidants… this surely lives up to its reputation as the new food prodigy on the block!
Even with these wondrous attributes Quinoa enjoys, I was personally never a great fan of it until I was introduced to this recipe by Rakhee Vaswani …, celebrity chef n friend. Now a
frequent start to many meals in my house, I’m sure it’ll grow just as fast on you’ll. Using multi-coloured quinoa turns it into a visual delight adding a new facet to this already multidimensional elixir.
Indian spices like cumin seed powder and black salt give this salad a desi style chatpata flavor while the fresh orange juice imparts the requisite tanginess.
You can manipulate the texture by adding nacho chips or jowar puffs on top whilst serving for that beautiful crunchiness.
A piece of advice: Serve chilled, and see, it drives away the scorching summer heat.
Happy clean eating folks!!! Do share your feedback!
| Course | Salad |
| Servings | 2-3 persons |
| Prep time | 10 min. |
| Cook time | 15 min. |
Ingredients for the Salad
|
|
| ½ cup | Quinoa (mixed colour) (I don’t prefer the only white ones) |
| ¼ th cup | Pearl Barley |
| A handful | Mixed salad leaves |
| ½ cup | Fresh pomegranate seeds |
| 1 cup | Fresh malta orange segments (skin peeled) |
| A handful | Nachni chips (lightly crushed) |
Ingredients for the dressing
|
|
| 3 nos. | Orange juice freshly squeezed |
| 1 tbsp | Jaggery (Gur) |
| 1 tsp | Cumin powder |
| ½ tsp | Orange zest |
| ½ tsp | Coarsely ground black pepper |
| ½ tsp | Kasundi mustard (or any other grainy mustard) |
| Salt to taste | |
| 2 tbsp | Olive Oil |
| 1 tsp | Black Salt |
Instructions for the salad |
|
| 1. | Wash the quinoa well (3-4 times). |
| 2. | Boil the Quinoa for about 20 minutes (1 cup water or stock for ½ cup Quinoa). |
| 3. | Wash the pearl barley well, drain and boil the barley until cooked. |
| 4. | Take a big mixing bowl; add the Quinoa, barley, salad leaves, pomegranate and orange segments. Toss well and keep in refrigerator to chill. |
Instructions for the dressing |
|
| 1. | Mix all the ingredients and keep aside to chill |
Assembling and Serving |
|
| 1. | Just 10 minutes before serving mix the dressing with the salad. Adjust seasoning if required. |
| 2. | Serve the salad in individual bowls or decorate in a ring mould as shown in the image. Top it with lightly crushed nachni chips. |
Notes:-
1. Add the chips just before serving to retain their crunch.
2. You can drizzle a little herb oil on top and also add crumbled feta if desired.
3. You can avoid the barley to make this salad completely gluten-free.
