Chickpea and Quinoa Salad with Ginger, Lemon, and Cumin Dressing

Fresh Cilantro Beside Veggies, Chickpeas, and Quinoa

One of our favorite food blogs, The Minimalist, posted a video for Chickpea Salad. I was inspired. I was also short on chickpeas. I got a little creative.

In this North African-inspired recipe, the first thing he recommends is toasting the cumin whole and then grinding it…. I’m ashamed to admit I just tossed in cumin powder. However, I will tell you I WANTED to toast the cumin whole and then grind it, but I had no whole cumin, and also had no time. When I’m more prepared and organized, I will do it the right way. But for now, the lazy way turned out pretty darned good too.

First off, we got the dressing started – plenty of lemon juice (a whole lemon, pulp and all), plenty of sliced ginger (about 2 tablespoons) and plenty of cumin (roughly 2 tablespoons as well), and a good dose of freshly ground salt. Side note: When I juice a lemon or lime, I usually cut the pulp out. It’s time consuming, but so worth it. Roll the fruit on the counter first, pressing hard to loosen the pulp, then cut in half width-wise. Simply use a paring knife to slice the little triangle wedges of pulp along the rind and membrane, then scoop out. Squeeze the empty shell of a rind well afterward so you don’t miss any of the juice! The result is plenty of pulpy citrus juice, none wasted!

Dressing of Lemon Juice, Fresh Ginger, and Cumin

I chopped up some red pepper, orange tomato, and yellow onion. Color is good.

Beautiful Vegetables

Mixed the veggies in with the dressing a bit….

Coating the Veggies in Dressing

And here’s where I strayed from Bitten…. again. I only had one can of chickpeas (yes, they were canned, not fresh… I’m sorry. But they were from Trader Joe’s, no preservatives, AND I rinsed them well!) and I knew that wasn’t going to go very far. However, I have found that chickpeas and quinoa go very well together! So I cooked up a small batch of quinoa and added that to the mix. For those of you new to quinoa (pronounced keen-wah), it’s a grain from South America that is wonderful. It’s super easy to cook – just like rice – and has more nutritional value and more protein than most other grains. And it’s inexpensive. A pound of organic quinoa at Trader Joe’s will run you around $2, if not less. It’s a great staple to have.

Quinoa!

Then I added my chickpeas…

Adding Some Chickpeas...

Getting all Mixed Up

And then another crucial ingredient… Cilantro. I love cilantro. I often use it like lettuce.

Delicious

Making Chickpeas and Quinoa Beautiful

Incorporate it all, and enjoy! Lots of wonderful flavors, and it makes a healthful side dish for grilling season.

Finished Product!

Tags: Mediterranean, North African, Quinoa, Veggies

This entry was posted on September 21st, 2008 and is filed under Recipes. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response or Trackback from your own site.