Quinoa gets a lift from crisp summer veggies in this simple, satisfying salad. By Deborah Willoughby
The ideal summer meal is cool, light, tasty, and bursting with garden-fresh vegetables. A main-dish salad is a good option, but if it’s missing a high-quality protein, you’re likely to find yourself casting about for a snack in an hour or two. But build a salad around quinoa and you’ll have a dish with staying power that’s still light enough for a summer day.
With a fluffy texture and a nutty flavor, quinoa is often thought of as a grain because it cooks like one, but it’s actually the seed of a leafy plant native to the Andes. It was prized by the Incas for its stamina-boosting effects and because it’s easy to grow—the plant thrives in poor soil, requires little water, and coats its seeds with a bitter substance unpalatable to birds and other predators. In addition to supplying a high concentration of all nine essential amino acids—making it a complete vegetarian protein—quinoa is high in iron, magnesium, phosphorus, and riboflavin. On top of that, it’s naturally gluten-free and easy to digest.
