I had some friends and their babies over for lunch this week {SO much fun!} and made this healthy mix of a salad to serve.
I hope I am not offending any distinguished Moroccan chefs by calling this Moroccan-inspired. I love the addition of dried fruit and nuts to any dish and this salad combines raisins, almonds and chickpeas with quinoa, spinach, capers and a tahini dressing.
Link to recipe {sorry I am having trouble embedding it}: Moroccan-Inspired Quinoa Salad
Here is a lovely photo of me I found on my camera making it the night before {thanks Matt!} I recommend putting it together in advance so the flavors and dressing can really soak in. We enjoyed it room temp the next day for lunch.
{ 79 comments… read them below or add one }
It looks so pretty! Love the nuttiness of red quinoa and tahini dressings are my fav!
Looks delicious.
Looks delicious. Love the dried fruit and chick peas with the nutritionally packed Quinoa.
Quinoa is so bland but packed with protein, thanks for making me want to cook some up today!! This looks yummy. Oh and about buckwheat, I’ve never tried it before but now it’s on my list of things to try
I much prefer the red kind to the yellow!
I might try this when I’m home. Hopefully, my family will like it, beause I think it sounds delicious!
You look really pretty!
Gorgeous and simple! I love easy recipes like this! And, you look great! I would never guess that you had a baby just a few months ago.
What a fun salad – so many of my favorite ingredients. Making this for dinner this week!
What a great looking salad Kath. I love the addition of the toasted almonds for a little crunch. I really enjot salads with varying textures!
This looks delicious. Ive been eating more chickpeas so this would be awesome.
And by the way, you look AMAZING! Never would have guessed you recently had a baby!
Yum, this looks and sounds delicious! I just wanted to let you know that under the “Ingredients” title, I’m seeing this message, which goes over the first ingredient: “Database query failed in get_recipe keyword query: You have an error in your SQL syntax; check the manual that corresponds to your MySQL server version for the right syntax to use near ” at line.” Also, I don’t see capers listed in the ingredients and I was wondering how much you used. I’m having a birthday dinner for my mom next weekend and I think I might make this as our salad!
Thanks – just fixed!
Mmmn, looks tasty!
Everything about the salad sounds delish…what would you suggest for a substitute for the tahini as we have a sesame seed allergy in the house. I could replace the almonds with toasted pumpkin seeds as we also have a nut allergy.
I’d do a simple olive oil + lemon dressing instead I think. Or perhaps a sunflower butter (or other nut butter that you can tolerate) to simulate the thickness?
Hi Susan,
Avocado would also be a really nice substitute! And maybe a little bit of nutritional yeast to give it more of a nutty flavour.
This looks delicious, Kath! I love raisins with red quinoa…Mmm apricots might be really nice with this too!!
Recipe looks awesome Kath! Definitely will try this one.
Looks divine – thanks for sharing the recipe with us!
Also – you look fabulous, Kath!
Beautiful! I love it that you’re posting so many more recipes these days…yay for the new KERF!!
Sounds delicious! And you are looking FABULOUS!!
Love the flavor combination in this one! Sounds delicious! I like making tabouleh with quinoa so it’s gluten free and adds a little extra protein to the mix.
I’m always looking for new quinoa recipes! This one looks great.
wow!!! look at those slim legs ; ) if only i looked like that after i had my little one… still working on it. one day at a time!
I’m totally down with salads like this right now. I’m putting together a few ideas of my own and this only helps fuel the creative fire!
Tivoli matches the salad bowl, how color coordinated you are. I am just looking into buying one of these model one radios for my new apartment… you like?
I LOVE the look, but it’s not my favorite electronic ever to be honest
The radio is really weak for tuning
I treated myself to a Bose. Love it.
quinoa + tahini = so good. hope you had a wonderful weekend, kath!
Oh yay, I have everything on hand! I was inspired and bought tahini about a month ago and then got intimidated and never used it. How long do you think this will stay in the fridge and still be tasty?
A day or two tops I think
Looks good! Love the addition of raisins and almonds!
Does Matt hold the camera above his head? Or is he really that much taller than you?!?
Ha ha, I have to ask also, how tall is matt when taking this picture? You look great, but it seems like he’s standing on a stool or something!
He’s 8 inches taller than I am
Well you look wonderful in the picture!
LOVE these flavors together. This looks delicious! I make a rendition of this a week in advance so that I can have it for lunch throughout the week. Next time you make it, add mint!
It would be great to hear your thoughts on the finished product, how it tasted, how filling etc. Also, can you share some nutritional information about a serving size? Thanks!
Kind of surprised I never got a response here. Any chance you can answer my questions? Thanks.
It was delicious – my friends couldn’t stop texting me about it after they left. Was a great compliment to our lunch spread. No idea on the nutritionals, but it was full of wholesome, healthy ingredients!
Pretty food and pretty new header!
I almost have all those ingredients! Looks delicious!
This looks really great…I love adding quinoa to salads – makes them super filling. For this you say to make it the night before…do you add the spinach then too? Or wait til the next day to add that?
I did for ease but it would have been more beautiful if I’d waited
This salad looks great! I like your new fonts you have on here too.
That looks yummy. I love tahini.
And Kath, you look adorable there!
Looks and sounds delicious. I bet it would be great to take to a BBQ in the summer. It seems so versatile
Love this! Definitely keeping it in my back pocket!
ooh, can’t wait to try this!
I make a similar quinoa salad. Love the tahini dressing. Yummy.
Yum!!! I am a fruit and nut- crazie too – and I am always looking for new ways to use the HUGE jar of Tahini I bought a couple months back.
I can’t see the last picture – it is a I <3 Kath Eats image!
I think you’ve been visiting the wrong websites then!
Same thing happens to me sometimes. Just double click and you can see them just fine!
I’m confused? I can see the last picture just fine – and seconding what others have said, you’re looking great, Kath! (I can only wish my legs were that slim!) What other websites are you talking about though? Seriously, I don’t get it. :/
I love all in one meals like this! Great ingredients!
New Pizza Hut ads? Matt’s pizza looks yummier!!!
beautiful! the salad looks great, too
I actually live in Morocco (I’m a Peace Corps volunteer) and I wish I could get a salad that looked this good! Unfortunately quiona and spinach do not exist (You can only find spinach in the cities I’ve heard), and tahini is outrageoulsy expensive and imported. I think a lot of people are under the impression that Moroccan food is exotic, flavorful, and spicy. But having lived here almost 11 months, I’d have to greatly disagree. Certainly there are some good dishes (That I know I will miss when I go back to the States) but on the whole Moroccan dishes tend to utilize many of the same spices (i.e. tumeric, cumin, paprika). I don’t find their food all that flavorful and varied.
Thanks for sharing your experience
Nice salad recipe, thank you Kath. And yes, you’re looking great – would not have guessed you were still very much pregnant a few months ago! Good inspiration to others (especially those of us who haven’t even been pregnant!)
You look great! How many months post-baby? And fitting into skinny jeans!
I love Moroccan-inspired food!! This looks so hearty and yummy…although I would omit the chickpeas. I LOVE hummus but I can’t stand eating whole chickpeas! Can’t figure it out myself, lol!
looks good, I have some digestive issues though, do you think this gels well if someone has a weak stomach?
I suppose that depends on your symptoms – perhaps leave out the beans + veggies if you need lower fiber?
Just in general nausea and irritation. But I still want to eat well! Can you point me to some recipes on the site that would be good for someone with irritable bowel type symptoms?
Yum!!!! This sounds so delicious! I love anything with chickpeas
I have never had Moroccan! It looks super flavorful though!
That salad looks amazing! I make a Greek inspired quinoa salad, so I am going to try this one soon!
I was wondering if you’d given any thought to the ethical issues regarding quinoa.
http://www.nydailynews.com/life-style/eats/ethical-eat-quinoa-article-1.1245075
Obviously not judging or saying you shouldn’t eat it! I still eat quinoa too. Just curious how you (and other readers) feel about it.
I actually just had a friend tell me about this and had no idea of the issue, which is very sad. I don’t think it’s a reason to completely boycott quinoa (because that would have its own set of detrimental effects) but definitely something to be aware of. I don’t eat a ton of it anyways. I don’t know enough about economics to know what a solution would be or what would be the best choice for us to make.
There’s a good article from Slate that explains the other side of the issue. Higher prices are actually good for the farmers growing the quinoa but they are a problem in urban parts of Bolivia and Peru, where people are used to eating a lot of quinoa and can no longer afford to do so. There’s also the environmental impact and the problems with buying food from so far away. Good thing I don’t like quinoa so I don’t have to think about it
http://www.slate.com/articles/life/food/2013/01/quinoa_bad_for_bolivian_and_peruvian_farmers_ignore_the_media_hand_wringing.html
http://bearwitnesspictures.blogspot.ca/2012/11/an-open-letter-to-npr-regarding-quinoa.html?m=1 this is a nice counter.
I can eat chickpeas rinsed right out of the can, but quinoa? I … really WANT to like it. But there’s something about its appearance that reminds me of a larva emerging. Maybe I’ll just close my eyes and eat it anyway.
Haha!
That salad looks delicious! I love when salads are colorful with lots of textures
Hey Kath,
How much did you pay for your saffron? It must be very expensive.
My family uses saffron a lot in cooking because of our culture and I always want to educate others how to properly use saffron.
You need a coffee grinder but one that is solely for spices. You put your threads in there and put a sugar cube too and pulverize until you have a powder. Then when you want to use it you will only need a tiny amount just for color and flavor about 1/8t
Found it at Trader Joe’s for $6. I like the sugary idea though
As soon as I saw this salad, I knew I had to try it out! I was excited to experiment with red quinoa and Whole Foods just happened to have it on sale last weekend! This salad turned out great! Thanks for sharing the recipe. I’m excited to have some of the leftovers in my lunch at work today.