This is not an ordinary salad. It’s one of those salads you can have as a proper meal, that you can prepare ahead of time and have on hand anytime you like during the day. It’s very filling, its full of protein and healthy fat and so versatile, we can keep changing ingredients according to what we have in hand. We made it this summer for the first time and can’t get over it ever since and now we’re going to add some autumn or wintery notes!
Ingredients (for 2 or 3)
1.5 cups of cooked quinoa
2 cups of cooked chickpeas (you can use leftovers)
plenty of arugula
1 cup of chopped bell peppers
1 cup of cherry tomatoes cut in half
2 sliced avocados
pumpkin seeds
pomegranate seeds (optional)
For the dressing
1 garlic clove
juice of ½ lemon
¼ cup of olive oil
¼ teaspoon of freshly ground pepper
pinch of salt
Method
Start by cooking quinoa and chickpeas. You can use store-bought cooked chickpeas to save time or use leftovers. If you decide to cook them from scratch, make sure you soak them overnight and then cook them the next day in salted water for about 1,5 hour. The water in the pot must cover them and be 8-10 cm above them. When it stars boiling, you must lower the heat and let it simmer until the chickpeas are tender.
Then you need to cook the quinoa. In a pot, boil 1.5 cup of quinoa with 3 cups of water and then lower the heat and let it simmer for about 15 minutes.
Continue by making the lemon dressing: Finely chop the garlic and mix it well with the olive oil, the lemon juice, salt and pepper in a small bowl.
Put all you ingredients of the salad (quinoa, peas, arugula, peppers, tomatoes, avocados) in a large bowl and pour your dressing on top.
Sprinkle some pumpkin and pomegranate seeds for extra texture, protein and vitamins.
