Some people impulse buy gum.
I impulse buy five-pound bags of quinoa.
Oh sure, I thought it was a lovely idea in that moment, romanced by all the things I could do with this versatile, healthy, nutritious ingredient chock full of protein and fibre.
Especially after I saw on the back of the hefty bag that I can cook quinoa in my rice cooker. (Cooking rice and rice-related ingredients? Not my forte. I blame it on a year living in Japan where my apartment came equipped with a rice cooker.)
And then I got the family-sized bag home, jammed it into my cupboard and kind of forgot about it as it occupied valuable real estate in my kitchen. I finally unearthed it many weeks later, concocting a biryani-style salad with currants, chickpeas and a curry-lime dressing.
And then I forgot about it again.
Since then, there has been a bit more experimenting with quinoa.
But there is also something to be said about going back to basics — honest-to-goodness classic dishes that remain in the cooking repertoire for a reason.
Things like tabouli.
Or tabbouli. Or even tabouleh.
Or however you want to spell it.
In theory, this is a salad I should like. Mint and parsley, lemon juice, tomato and cucumber. All those herbs with that zip of acidic lemon, the crunch of cucumber and umami taste of tomato? I like all those things. A lot.
What I don’t like is bulgur, the grain traditionally used in tabbouleh salads.
I made a huge bowl of it once using a recipe that called for bulgur and then had to eat it for two days to get through it, hating it the entire time.
I didn’t like the taste or the chew and forcing myself to finish the thing, which had taken a bit of time and effort to prepare, did not help the situation.
So, as I was sorting through my cupboards the other day and stumbled across the still half-full bag of impulse quinoa, I was struck by a thought: why not make tabbouleh with a grain-like ingredient I actually enjoy?
And I pulled out my rice cooker and did exactly that.
(As a result of cooking it this way, I can offer you no suggestions or guidelines for cooking quinoa, other than tell you what I was also told: give it a bit of a rinse or a soak – say about 10 minutes or so — before cooking, which should alleviate any of the bitterness you might taste otherwise.)
With the exception of using quinoa and the addition of a red (or orange or yellow) paper for a bit of additional colour and crunch, this recipe holds quite true to traditional tabbouleh.
It’s the abundance of herbs, slight onion bite from the green onions and generous amount of lemon juice that gives it such a refreshing and light taste.
It’s the substitution of quinoa for bulgur that makes it no hardship to finish it off pretty quickly.
And, thankfully, I still have plenty more quinoa to make this again.
Quinoa Tabbouleh
- 4 cups (1 L) cooked quinoa
- 1 red, orange or yellow pepper, diced
- 1 cup (250 mL) cherry or grape tomatoes, halved or quartered
- 2 to 4 green onions, sliced thinly
- 2 mini cucumbers, halved, seeded and sliced
- ¼ cup (50 mL) mint, chopped
- ¼ cup (50 mL) parsley, chopped
- 1/3 cup (75 mL) lemon juice (from about 2 lemons)
- 1 tsp (5 mL) salt
- freshly ground pepper
- 1/3 cup (75 mL) extra virgin olive oil
Cook quinoa according to directions. Let cool and place in large bowl. Add red pepper, tomatoes, green onions, cucumbers, mint and parsley. In separate bowl, mix lemon juice, salt and pepper. Whisk to dissolve salt. While whisking, slowly drizzle in olive oil to emulsify. Pour about ¾ of the dressing over the salad and toss. Add the remaining dressing if the salad seems dry.
Serves 4.
This piece originally ran in the Calgary Herald. For more great recipes and stories, head to the Herald’s food page at CalgaryHerald.com/life.
