When I was in high school, yes, at a time when dinosaurs roamed the Earth, my parents invited an exchange student from Peru to live with us for a year. His name was Jorge but we all called him Coco.
When he arrived he didn’t speak a word of English so of course instead of speaking really slowly, we talked louder. The urge to speak louder to someone who doesn’t understand your language is weird but we all did it. He was a lovely young man and we learned a lot about Peru that year.
Do you like quinoa? I went for the longest while when the trend first started, refusing to follow the leader and one day I broke down and tried it. It’s really good and much of it is grown in Peru.
Quinoa is an ancient grain from the time of the Aztec empire and it’s got as much essential aminoacids as red meat plus it’s gluten free and high in calcium, fibre and iron. It’s just what I need right now.
I received an email from the kind folks at the Brisbane Good Food and Wine Show wanting to know if I’d like to give away two free tickets to the show coming up in early November to five lucky winners. Why not? The tickets are $25 each so it’s a good saving so you can buy more stuff while you’re there.
I love food shows and let’s not get me started about wine. This year the Brisbane owners of Andes Mills, sisters Fe and Maria Mendoza, will be launching their new brand of products at the Good Food and Wine Show and they’re offering my winners a packet of their quinoa straight from Peru.
Their grandfather Enrique Mendoza was an agronomist in Peru who designed a program for the Peruvian government to promote the growth and consumption of quinoa back in the 1980s. We’re all eating it now so he must have done a very good job!
Andes Mills is a family owned company with a mission to bring quality, healthy super foods to our Australian tables. They know their quinoa is the best because they grow it themselves – knowing what’s in the soil and knowing there are no pesticides ever used on their grain. Starting a business where you grow your own grain in a country on another continent is tough but they’ve proven that Queenslanders have the right stuff.
If you’re in Brisbane or will be in Brisbane between November 8th – 10th, please leave a comment that you’d like to be included in the draw for two free tickets and a 500 gram package of organic Quinoa.
Now, you know I’ve said I’m doing my best to add some healthy foods to my diet and Maria and Fe sent me a packet of their quinoa to try. I made my favourite quinoa salad with a curried balsamic dressing. I can eat this for any meal or as a snack. It’s filled with red and green capsicum (sweet peppers), red onion, scallions/spring onions/shallots (depending upon the word you use), celery, coriander (cilantr0), parsley, peanuts, dried cranberries, dried blueberries and sultanas (or raisins) with lots of fluffy cooked quinoa.
Yes I put more than the required dried fruit because I really like it. I should have added the extra AFTER I took the photo. Too late because I already ate it.
- 1 cup Quinoa
- 1 red onion finely diced
- ½ cup sultanas
- ½ cup dried cranberries (craisins)
- ¼ cup dried blueberries
- 1 cup roasted peanuts (save ¼ cup for garnish)
- 1 red capsicum finely diced
- 1 green capsicum finely diced
- ½ cup chopped parsley
- ½ cup chopped coriander
- ½ cup chopped celery
- 1 cup peas (fresh or frozen-thawed)
- 1 heaping teaspoon ground coriander
- ¼ teaspoon ground cinnamon
- 1 teaspoon ground cumin
- 1 fresh red chilli finely diced
- 1 teaspoon finely grated fresh ginger
- 3 tablespoons good olive oil
- 3 tablespoons white balsamic vinegar
- 1 teaspoon brown sugar if you want it sweeter (optional)
- Fresh coriander leaves and a few peanuts for garnish
- Rinse quinoa grains in cold water and drain using a fine mesh strainer
- Cook quinoa in a pan of boiling water approx 9-10 minutes til grains are soft
- Drain well through a fine sieve and set aside to cool while you make the dressing.
- Combine coriander, cumin, cinnamon, chilli, ginger and garlic
- Add to oil and vinegar in a bowl to make the dressing and set aside
- Combine all other ingredients
- Fold dressing through
- Pile high on serving platter
- Garnish with peanuts and coriander leaves and serve immediately.
I always wanted to be an exchange student or to have one living with us for a while. It’s so exciting to learn about different cultures, especially food cultures of course. Lovely healthy salad Maureen, I really should cook more with quinoa!
I’m pretty much on the quinoa bandwagon. It’s a bit bland served all by itself (but then, so are lots of other things), but really shines when combined with other ingredients. Like you did in this great looking salad – so perfect for your warm weather! Love the idea of curried balsamic dressing – not something I’ve thought to do, and should. Thanks.
We are working with couple of exchange students who are planning to come from Scotland for 4 weeks. Cant’ for that experience.
Now this salad i can eat anytime. Delicious and healthy.
Hosting exchange students is a wonderful way thing to do. Everyone benefits … the student gets to be part of a home away from home and the hosts get to learn about a new country. I’ve yet to try quinoa. The other ingredients in the dish sound very tasty and I have most of them already. Perhaps I’ll pick up a cup the next time I visit the bulk food store and give it a try. 🙂
LOL, Maureen, you are so funny…. I loved the introduction… coming from a European family, I used to see and hear people yelling at my parents all the time… : )
Love this healthy recipe… quinoa is great…. wish it didn’t mess with my stomach. Great post. Thanks.
You had me laughing at how you yelled at the poor Peruvian! I’m guilty of yelling at foreigners too! I love quinoa and yesterday, when I heard that hear today in Sydney we’re heading for a blistering 39C, mentally decided that dinner will be a quinoa salad! Great minds think alike! xx
My husband had a colleague who professed the same logic: talk loud enough and you will be understood. I usually use more hand gestures which can be as ridiculous as talking loudly. A year is a very long time for an exchange student, were your parents teachers? I’ve heard of exchange students here and they are usually only a month or two.
Dinosaurs…oh my!
Quinoa is one if my favourites and your salad looks like it would hit the spot. Wish I was close enough to get to your food show, it sounds fabulous!
I love quinoa! This salad looks so delicious.
I would love to be included in the draw for the Brisbane Good Food and Wine show; thanks!
Salad looks amazing! Have never tired quinoa. Looks and sounds like I must try.
If the owners of Andes Mills want to pay to send me to Brisbane – LOL – I woould like to be in the drawing too.
Talking louder instead of slower…hehehehehhe!! You are so funny Maureen!! Love the Quinoa…..it looks refreshing and the pictures are so neat.
Maureen this gets my vote as the funniest opening paragraph on your blog! 😛 Lovely looking recipe too!
What a colorfully exciting healthy salad Maureen, true!
Might have to ask my dinosaur reles if they went to school with you! lol
I have never tried quinoa to date, but is on the list to do!
Thank you for making me laugh with your opening paragraph today!
Cheers! Joanne
I probably know your rellies 🙂
I held off on trying quinoa for the longest time as well…maybe it’s because we both lived when dinosaurs roamed the earth? But I love it…and will try your gorgeous salad! Mine will have extra fruit, too 🙂
You’re a spring chicken compared to me. Hang around more often, you’ll start feeling younger every day. 🙂
Hi Maureen,
I’m a fairly new reader of your blog and I am loving all of the recipes you post!
We had lots of exchange students who came to stay with my family from 2 weeks up to 11 months from many different countries. I loved the experience. When we had our first Japanese students stay with us my brother and I put up stickers around the house labelling different items – the students loved it!
Your quinoa salad looks so pretty and sounds delicious – I might just have to make it this weekend! I’d love to be in the running to win tickets to the Brisbane Good Food and Wine show!
Cheers, Courtney
We did that for Coco too and quite a few years ago we had exchange students from Sweden and Norway and we put up signs too. (Who knew they ate meat sandwiches for breakfast?) Thanks so much for leaving a comment, Courtney!
1. Absolutely love the dressing!
2. Eat an awful lot of quinoa: for ages and ages ~ would you believe two close friends have tried to ‘ introduce’ me to the stuff this week, including five differing pronounciations!!
3. Charlie: you are not living amidst a huge eucalypt ‘forest’: uhuh? Like burning at 60-70 kms/hr? Hugs, but, thank God, it’s past 2 pm and neither wind speed nor temps are quite what we feared!! FGS, be happy in the city: wish I was there 🙂 !
4. Talk loudly? Definitey not: look a person in the eye and talk slowly and softly . . .
yes, you’re right but the human response is to speak louder if someone doesn’t understand you. 🙂
I’d love to go! I’m going to make this salad too.
This is a great looking salad, Maureen. Such a great variety of ingredients and textures, just like a truly good salad should have. That’s a great dressing that you’ve created, too. In fact, everything about this salad is fantastic. I’ve pinned it. I want to give it a try. Thanks for sharing.
People are often very impressed with Quinoa , but I have never tasted it myself.. I have to look for it…
Wow exchange students for a year, how long we’re you yelling for? Love the look of your quinoa salad. I really need to be using this more. GG
I have to admit I’m not a big fan of quinoa, only because I’ve never tried it as a salad, dressed. I only cooked it like rice and served it as a side to steak. I LOVE the flavours going on in your curried Balsamic Dressing so will give quinoa another chance 😉
I don’t think I would eat it in a pile on its own. 🙂
That does like awesome Maureen, despite the dried fruit overdose… Lol… I love quinoa too. It’s so versatile and easy to incorporate into just about anything
This does look nice and healthy.
I still haven’t quite made friends with quionoa but clearly I had good intentions because when I cleared out the pantry I found 3 bags of the stuff!
This sounds and looks absolutely wonderful!! I’m so glad you have such scrumptious things to eat that are healing too. XO I’d love to be included in the drawing. 🙂
Ah love anything with quinoa lately! Looks fabulous 🙂
My doctor has been trying to get me into quinoa as a gluten substitute but I find it unappealing. This recipe sounds good, if I could just get past the fact that it’s filled with quinoa…
Lovely to meet you, Fly Girl!
Oh Maureen, this sounds so good! I would have never thought to combine curry and balsamic but I love the idea, also love that last photo, so pretty!!!
I know so many Americans hosting or hosted an exchange student for a year (my mom came to the US back then as an exchange student too). It must be an interesting experience to live with someone from another country! I’d love to do that one day… 🙂 Anyway your quinoa salad looks delicious, especially the dressing. I must try this one.
Really beautiful and healthy dish… I love you house added some curry flavors into it. 🙂
We are quinoa fans all the way. It seems the more flavor you add – all the better. Love the fruit – that little bit of sweet is perfect.
Let me know if you try this!
I was a little late to the quinoa party too, Maureen, as I hate fad foods. But this is one that I really like – and so do my very fussy kids. It’s nice to find something everyone enjoys and that is healthy. Doesn’t happen often enough.
I don’t get caught up in the “this food will cure all ills” until I see it in the medical journals. I eat quinoa because I like it. I like the teensy bite to it and it goes well in this salad.
I adore quinoa although I sometimes wish I wasn’t part of the trend that is sweeping the world – I feel like I’m being fashionable in my tastes whereas I really do just love it! I’m glad you’ve found it enjoyable too and I would LOVE this salad 🙂
Oh this looks delicious! I know what you mean about talking louder. Our daughter was just saying to my husband the other day ” have you noticed how when someone doesn’t speak English real well mom talks louder to them” I am not sure why we do that!lol
At least I’m not alone 🙂
This looks so delicious! I know what you mean about talking louder. Our daughter was just saying to my husband the other day ” have you noticed that when someone doesn’t speak English real well mom talks louder to them” I don’t know why we do that! lol
That is one heck of a salad! Lots and lots of deliciousness! I’ve had a jar of quinoa in my pantry for weeks. I think it’s time to put it to use. This salad has it all. Sounds like you had a great time in Brisbane.
I love this version of quinoa salad. Your curried balsamic dressing is very appealing. I love quinoa for lunch, it is light, healthy and filling. Plus you can keep the cooked plain quinoa for about 3 days which is a huge bonus at work. I look forward to trying your sweet/curry version tomorrow for lunch. Thanks for sharing! 😀
I really like this one and if I keep it without the fruit and dressing, it keeps for several days in the fridge.
ahahah so you discovered quinoa before is was a trend back in prehistoric times. 🙂 I guess I could be a fossil or sorts as well. Loved the opening paragraph so well written and made me giggle. Love this salad. Never thought of curried balsamic. What a brilliant idea.
French being my first language, I can relate to your post. Love quinoa and I will try this colorful recipe for sure. Thanks!
I’m glad!
Pick me! I’ve always wanted to go to this AND I love quinoa.
Love the spices in your dressing. I’m going to make this one – right up my alley. And maybe I can even get husband excited about it. He thinks quinoa looks and tastes like plastic! But you’ve got a lot of other good things going on here to maybe change his mind.
My husband will eat this on day one but like everything else that’s “leftover” he won’t touch it. He says he will but in truth… he doesn’t. 🙂 I LOVE this dressing.
In this quinoa salad recipe, the instructions reference garlic but I con’t see that in the ingredients list. How much did you use?
Ack! It’s a cup of quinoa. I’ll go fix it. Thanks.
Lovely curried balsamic dressing. The cumin is a great addition to a balsamic dressing to make it have a more eastern flavour.