Browsing Tag

sweet potato salad

Food

Culinary Pursuits: Warm Kale Quinoa Salad

September 16, 2014

I’ve officially been a PhD student for a month now and so far, so good. Balancing a full course load with my research assistantship and taking time to just breathe has been a challenge, but I’m hanging in there. No rest for the weary! Fortunately, I’m surrounded by good people and that has made all the difference. It also helps that I have a great space to come back to after a long day. I love my apartment (especially my kitchen). It’s so nice and spacious so I feel like I have to put it to good use. One of the first dishes I made in it was this warm kale quinoa salad. It was too yummy not to share the recipe so check it out below!
Ingredients:
1/3 cup of coconut milk
1 cup of quinoa
Kale (6 cups)
4 cups of sweet potatoes
15 oz can of black beans
15 oz can of garbanzo beans
curry powder
sea salt
Olive oil spray

Directions:
Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.
Dice two medium sized sweet potatoes, spray them with olive oil and sprinkle on some sea salt.
Pop them in the oven for 35-40 minutes
Follow package instructions for cooking quinoa. I like to add sea salt and curry to the water I use to cook the quinoa so it’s more flavorful.
While quinoa is cooking, cook the beans (adding curry powder and sea salt to taste) on medium to high heat for 3-4 minutes (Don’t drain the sauce from the beans. You’ll use that for the kale).
Once the beans are done stir in the kale one cup at a time until it shrinks in volume.
Once quinoa is done add coconut milk and stir.
Add the sweet potatoes and the kale-bean mix to the quinoa and stir.
Optional: Garnish with goat cheese and sliced honey roasted almonds.

Food

Arugula Salad

May 27, 2014

At the end of March, I went to Baltimore for a weekend trip and had this sweet potato salad. It was incredibly good, and as I’ve started doing with really good food that I order at restaurants, I decided I would attempt to recreate the magic that happened on that plate at home.
I think I love salads now. Like I legitimately love them. I’ve liked salads well enough before but it was a rarity for me to actually crave them. Well I discovered something that has made them so much better, and was a part of the reason why I loved that salad in Baltimore so much. Back in the day I used to use lettuce as the base for my salads, then I eventually switched to spinach, but now I’ve discovered arugula. I was buying it to use as a filling in a wrap a couple of weeks ago, and before it went bad I decided to use it for a salad. Great decision. It didn’t taste like a salad. Every iteration I’ve tried has been delicious. I first had it with baked chicken, black beans, garbanzo beans, and goat cheese.

When I ran out of baked chicken, I used an apple chicken sausage link, and when I ran out of those I used oven roasted sweet potato wedges. And it doesn’t need any dressing. Seriously, I don’t know what I was doing with my life before. I may have been late to the party, but I’m here now.

Speaking of parties, hope you enjoyed your Memorial Day Weekend!