Cold Quinoa Salad: Easy to Pack, Fun to Say

I make up a decent sized batch of quinoa at the beginning of the week (usually on oatmeal day) and have enough to have this salad for lunch over the next couple of days. It keeps well for about five days--I haven't had enough to push this experiment to the limit because there's never any left after that long, though I'd be interested in seeing how long it takes before it starts walking on its own... Anyway, rock the quinoa early on in the day so it has time to cool before lunch.

Here's What You're Gonna Need:
1 cup quinoa
1 can (low sodium, if possible) vegetable broth

1 can garbanzo beans / Ceci beans / chick peas, however you say it in your neck of the woods
3 stocks celery, chopped
3 carrots, chopped
(prep time built in)

spring mix / baby lettuce, optional

flax seed
balsamic vinegar
extra virgin olive oil, optional
hard boiled egg, optional

And Here's What You're Gonna Do:

Bring vegetable broth to a boil in a medium pot. While you're waiting for that to happen, rinse and drain quinoa.

Plop clean quinoa into the pot of boiling broth, knock the heat down to medium low, and put a lid on it. Simmer for 11 minutes while chop the celery and carrots.

When the time's up, remove the pot from the heat, keep the lid on and let it hang out for about 5 minutes to finish absorbing the liquid. After five minutes whisk the lid off, and fluff the quinoa with a fork. If it's close-ish to lunch time, take out a bowl of however much you're going to eat today and either set it on the counter or in the fridge to cool. You can let the rest cool down on it's own and then store it in a Tupperware container in the fridge.

Assembly time!
1. salad greens, optional
2. quinoa
3. mix in a little balsamic
4. hard boiled egg, optional
5. carrots and celery
6. more balsamic vinegar and olive oil, if you want it
7. flax seed
8. Ta da! You're full of fiber, omega 3s, and complete protein. Now aren't you smart?

Apple Cinnamon Oatmeal with Steel Cut Oats

I recently found out that although my mother enjoys steel cut oats, she fears making them because they're sticky, fussy, have a knack for boiling over, and take forty-seven days to make. These are common fears among the oat eating populace, but it doesn't have to be that way! Rise up, friends, face your fears, and go for this half an hour non-fussy version of steel cut oats. You will survive. And you'll have a fabulous breakfast packed with protein, fiber, iron and other awesome things that will give you super powers such as x-ray vision and the ability to fly.* We're going to make a big batch so you'll only have to do it twice a week. (And by "it" I mean make oatmeal. You can do the other "it" as many times a week as you want. I'm not here to judge, just to make oats. And by "make oats" I mean have sex.)



Apple Cinnamon Oatmeal with Steel Cut Oats


Here's What You're Gonna Need:

1 cup of steel cut oats (if gluten is a concern, check to make sure the oats are certified gluten free)
3 cups of water

2 medium apples (red or green)
1/2-1 tsp cinnamon
a splash of vanilla extract (1/4ish tsp)

For individual servings (optional):
brown sugar
milled flax seed (Adds fiber, omega 3s, a little extra protein and a lovely nutty flavor. Do it!)
slivered almonds


And Here's What You're Gonna Do:

Bring three cups of water to a boil. Add oats and a small pinch of salt. Reduce the heat to medium-medium low (you want a low simmer, not an oatmeal volcano). Do not cover. Cook for about 20 minutes. Stir your oatmeal whenever you get the gumption to so so it doesn't stick.

While you're waiting on your oatmeal, work on the apples. Peel and dice apples into small pieces. Put them in a small pot with a couple of tablespoons of water. Add cinnamon and vanilla extract, slap a lid on it, and put it over high heat until the water comes to a boil. This won't take long. Cut the heat, keep the lid on, and let the apples steam for 5-10 minutes, or until desired state of firmness / mushiness is reached. You can also do this step in the microwave

After 20 minutes, take the oatmeal off of the heat, put the lid on, and let it hang out for at least five minutes or whenever it is you get hungry.

Heap today's serving in a bowl, stir in brown sugar (optional) and milled flax seed, top with apples and almonds and enjoy!

The rest of the oatmeal and apples will keep in the fridge for a couple of days. Reheat your oatmeal in the microwave--I usually add a splash of half and half before nuking. Now that wasn't so bad, was it?

*ability to fly not guaranteed.

How to Rock a Blueberry Muffin (Instead of a Doughnut)

In a (failed) attempt to distract myself from Dunkin' Donuts, I rocked some blueberry muffins with my super hero health powers the other day. And because I'm caring as well as magical, I shall share with you my healthier version of an old classic. They're a little time intensive (but that's probably just because I have kitchen ADD--add some flour, eat a snack, etc), so we're making a big ass batch here. They freeze really well, so stash some away for the next time the doughnut demons come stalking you.

Here's what you're gonna need:
(I split ingredients into groupings of when you'll need them because without a visual reminder I just keep adding stuff to the bowl with complete disregard for the rightful order of things. Again, kitchen ADD.)

2 cups whole wheat flour
1 1/2 cups all purpose flour
1/2 cup wheat germ
2 teaspoons baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
6 tablespoons milled brown flax seed
--
1 stick + 6 tablespoons unsalted butter* (room temperature or slightly softened in the microwave)
2/3 cup sugar
2/3 cup packed light brown sugar
--
4 eggs
4-5 (depending on size) crazy old bananas (like, you want these suckers are borderline gross)
2/3 cup 2% milk
2 1/2 teaspoons vanilla extract
--
2 1/2 cups frozen blueberries (organic wild blueberries work best, b/c they're smaller and usually more flavorful, but don't let your possession of regular frozen blueberries stop you from rocking these muffins)

*(I know this seems like a lot of butter, but we're actually substituting flax seed for the even greater amount of butter it would take to make these muffins if we weren't rocking them. And remember, it's nothing compared to the nutritional value of the doughnut from which we're trying to distract ourselves here. I only had 6 tablespoons of flax seed, or I might have tried switching out even more for less butter. If you dare tinker around here, try substituting 3 more tablespoons flax seed for 1 tablespoon butter. Let me know how it goes, Dr. Frankenstein.)

And here's what you're gonna to do:

Preheat your oven to 375. Line two 1 dozen muffin tins with paper liners.

In a large bowl, whisk/blend/sift/put a lid on the bowl and shake/mix with your hands the flour, wheat germ, baking soda, salt and flax seed.

In another big bowl or in your mixer, beat butter, sugar and brown sugar until fluffy and lovely. Add in the eggs one at a time, beating after each one.

In yet another bowl (we're making a grand mess here, folks), mash the hell out of those verge-of-rotten bananas, then stir the milk and vanilla into your beautiful banana mess.

Put your mixer on low and add the flour mixture and the banana mixture to the butter and sugar mixture. The flour and bananas are going to have to take turns here, going flour stuff, banana stuff, flour stuff, etc into the bowl. Try to end on a flour stuff and for God's sake, don't over mix it. Tip: If you have one of those plastic flexible cutting board dealies, fashion it into a shoot and pour the flour down it and into the mixing bowl, so as not to blow flour all over your kitchen like I did the first (and second) time I rocked these muffins.

Fold in the still frozen blueberries.

Very lighty spray your paper liners, and add the muffin mix. You'll get about two dozen regular size muffins, plus maybe three or four of those big ass ones (you have to have a special pan for such a thing) that are great because you can pretend you're only eating two muffins (reasonable) when in reality you're eating the equivalent of four (less reasonable).

Bake for about 25 minutes, or until your poking-at-things stick comes clean. Let them cool for a minute, then turn them out onto a rack to finish cooling. (Then drive to Dunkin' Donuts and get yourself a chocolate glazed doughnut to tide you over while you're waiting for them to cool.)

Enjoy!