Green and White Salad

Cooking Tip 101 (Preventing spillage on the stove top when cooking grains)

Do you add oil to your pasta cooking water? Have you been told it prevents your pasta sticking together/ I stopped adding oil to my pasta water more than a decade ago because my pasta never stuck together whether I had oil in the water or not and I just thought it was a waste of oil.

However recently that has all changed for me. Only the other night when I was reading one of my textbooks for my masters in nutrition I found out the real reason why we are told to put oil into the water when cooking pasta.

Adding a teaspoon of oil stops the water from boiling over. How cool is that? Adding a tsp of oil to the cooking water of any grain decreases the surface tension of the water and prevents the water forming bubbles and then boiling over.

Wow it has taken me 51 years to work this one out. I’m so happy I am doing my masters if it is for this fact alone.

No more cleaning up a messy stove top from water and grains boiling all over it.

This week’s recipe is a quinoa recipe. Right now I cannot get enough quinoa in my diet. I buy the locally grown one so it needs to be soaked that’s for sure. Actually all quinoa needs to be soaked as do all whole grains (yep I know quinoa is a seed but many seeds need to be soaked too). Soaking grains removes the phytic acid that can inhibit the absorption of calcium and iron. Another plus to soaking quinoa is that it only takes 5 minutes to cook if it has been soaked.

This warm salad I share with you is a green and white salad. Many people say to eat a rainbow and mostly I do that, ensuring there is lots of variety of colour in my meals but sometimes I just need a green and white meal like this recipe.

Adding lots of green veggies to boost the chlorophyll for building the immune system and adding more antioxidants into the diet is a common occurrence in our household. We had this warm salad for dinner last night and I felt so satisfied eating it. My body was happy.

Green and White Salad

Enough for 3 people as a main

Ingredients

1 cup quinoa soaked overnight or at least 4 hours

1 tsp olive oil

1 tsp herb salt

1 cup Brussel sprouts cut into quarters (can choose another green veg)

1 small head broccoli cut into florets

1 bunch asparagus (woody end snapped off and cut small)

Few green beans

2 handfuls spinach

Handful sugar snaps or snow peas (sliced thinly

1 avocado sliced

Italian Dressing

6 tbsp mayonnaise or cashew cheese

1 tbsp red or white wine vinegar

2 tsp pomegranate molasses or maple syrup

2 cloves cooked garlic minced

2 tbsp chopped fresh basil or other Italian herbs (oregano, thyme)

1 tbsp olive oil (optional)

Salt and pepper to taste

Method

For the dressing place everything in a bowl and whisk.
Bring a saucepan of water and 1 tsp olive oil and herb salt to the boil, add the quinoa and cook for 5 minutes or until the quinoa has little white tails showing.
Steam all the veggies except the sugar snaps or snow peas.
Mix the cooked quinoa and steamed veg together, serve on individual plates and top with the sugar snaps or snow peas and avocado. Serve with the dressing.

# If you make this recipe please share on facebook or instagram to #veetsvegancookingschool

Cooking School News

Cooking and Nutrition Sessions

I am receiving so much positive feedback from the individual cooking and nutrition sessions. Remember I have a special on them for the whole of October. A one hour session is $195 face to face including all ingredients or $175 online and for the month of October you will receive an extra 30 minutes for every hour booked in and you can bring a friend along for free- even on zoom you can do this and even if they are in a different town to you. Book in today so you don’t miss out as October is already moving along quickly.

Gift cards for these sessions are also available.

Food Analysis/Nutrition

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Another online offering I have is the online cooking course ‘Cooking at Home with Veet.’ This is real value for money as the course has no time limit so you can do the course over and over again if you wish. The recipes in the course are sensational and I love receiving comments from people who are doing the course on how good the recipes are. This program is a great gift idea for birthdays and Christmas (which really is only around the corner - eech)