If you don’t live in the UK – or you’re lucky enough to live in a part of the UK that’s been having nice weather recently – you might not know that our Great British Summer has been all but non-existent. This is what the weather’s been doing lately in my lovely part of England: sun! It’s sunny and everyone’s happy. People plan barbeques and other frivolous sunny outdoor things. Suddenly the clouds appear. Soon the rains come. These rains range from averagely annoying to creating floods of Biblical proportions.
So today it’s been nice and summery and warm and I wanted something nice and summery and warm to eat. I also wanted something meatless, because after cooking a steak and kidney pie at work I did not fancy eating much meat. (Don’t get me wrong, I’m all about the steak and kidney, but there’s nothing like dealing with mass amounts of raw meat to make you fancy something a bit more on the vegetarian side.)
In steps this warm, summery salad creation full of tasty things like courgettes and halloumi and quinoa. Ideally I would have liked to eat it outside while bathing in the sun, but a) I ate it while sorting out my wardrobe and b) I am so terrified of the impending showers that I don’t really want to go outside.
Maybe it’s not the most attractive dish in the world. But it’s easy and delicious and good for you. So there.
Cook the quinoa. (Don’t listen to the suggested serving size on the packet, they don’t know you.) Chop up some celery and courgettes – or any other combination of vegetables that you want in your salad. Chop some halloumi into cubes. Drain the cooked quinoa and set aside. Fry the halloumi and vegetables in the oil of your choice (I used about a teaspoon of rapeseed oil). Add the quinoa and stir everything together in the pan for a few seconds. Arrange some fancy salad leaves in a bowl or on a plate, then spoon your quinoa and vegetable mixture over the top. (I only ended up using about two thirds of the mixture and put the rest in the fridge to eat tomorrow.) I added some cooked beetroot on top but only because we have some in the fridge that needed eating.
I’ve got to say that it was pretty delicious. I love the nutty flavour and odd texture of quinoa, and there’s something about warm stuff on salad leaves that’s really nice.
(In vaguely relevant health-related news, I am currently on day 4 of the 30 Day Shred and have not yet keeled over. Which is fantastic. I attempted it about 6 months ago and by the time I got to day 5 I ached all over and could not force myself to switch on the dvd and gave up. So it’s awesome to know that I’ve got fitter since then, and awesome that hopefully I will be even fitter by the end of the month.)
What’s the weather like for you?
