Kale Quinoa Salad (Fig Balsamic, Lemon Olive Oil)
/Side Dish Club recipes were designed to be produced by weight in grams so that nutrition information could be calculated so you will need a scale to replicate them.
Each recipe produces four servings for a side dish next to a main dish. This size is 115 grams or about 4 ounces (1/4 lb) in weight and about 3/4 cup in volume. For a full meal, you would double the serving size, and this recipe would produce two.
So many people are not excited about eating kale, but when I share this recipe, they often are not even aware how much they are eating. This is a good recipe to start loveing kale with.
What you will need:
Qunoa
Fresh curly kale - 1 bunch
Raw walnuts - a handful
Dried cranberries - a handful
Crumbled feta cheese - You can purchase already crumbled feta, but note that it may be a bit dry. You can purchase block feta and crumble it yourself; it will be moist and some will stick to your fingers, but if you don’t mind licking your fingers this may be a plus! Recently I have been using sheeps milk feta and find it delicious.
Better Than Boullion (Vegetable or Chicken) - Better than Boullion is used in many side dish club recipes. We love it because it tastes super fresh and you can get it in low-salt versions which we prefer since these days almost everything is over salted. You can use either chicken or vegetable broth for this recipe depending on the flavor profile you prefer. We generally like to use chicken, but that is not a good option for vegetarians. To read more about this product, here is a link to the website for Better Than Boullion.
Fig balsamic vinegar
Lemon olive oil
Cook the quinoa.
Measure out about 10 grams of raw quinoa to end up with about 198 grams cooked for your recipe. Cook in accordance with package instructions, but add 1 Tablespoon of Better than Boullion to the warm cooking water. Make sure to stir in the boullion until it is dissolved in the water before adding the quinoa or you will get sections of quinoa with all of the boullion and some with none … yuck!
Once your quinoa is cooked, measure out 198 grams and set it aside to cool in the refrigerator. The amount you get cooked from raw is not exact so you may end up with a little extra.
Wash and dry and prepare the kale.
You can do this while the quinoa is cooling.
Kale is easier to wash if you remove the center spine before washing. A small pairing knife works well. Just lay the leaf out on a cutting board and cut down the side of each spine. I usually start a little below the top of the leaf where the spine starts to thicken.
I always thoroughly wash my garden ingredients before using them. I create a vinegar wash (about 1 cup of white vinegar to a gallon of water) and place the garden ingredients into the vinegar wash for about 5 minutes before rinsing. This is just “me” as I worry about germs on fresh veggies. But the vinegar wash is certainly optional.
Also thoroughly dry your vegetables, which in this case is the kale, before using. You want to avoid using wet vegetables because the water on the vegetables will water down your dressing and thus your flavor. I usually just set my leaves out to dry, but if you are in a rush, you can put use a fan set on low to blow are over them and accelerate drying or pat them dry with a towel.
Measure, massage and chop:
Measure out about 95 grams of leaves. (See next section below on measuring for this.)
Massage the leaves by rubbing them in a bunch onto a cutting board until they are soft and you no longer feel them breaking down as you massage them.
Finely chop the massaged kale and place into your large bowl.
Prepare and measure your ingredients.
For measuring I suggest the following:
Set your scale on the counter and turn it on.
Make sure it is set to grams.
Set a large bowl on the side to hold all of your measured ingredients.
Set a smaller container on the scale to collect your individual ingredients
Tare out the scale to remove the weight of the container on the scale.
Next …
Walnuts: Take a handful of walnuts and chop them. Put the chopped walnuts into the bowl on the scale until you have 50 grams and then put them into the larger bowl. Replace the empty bowl onto the scale and re-tare so the scale shows zero.
Dried Cranberries: Measure cranberries into the scale dish until you have approximately 30 grams (it may be a bit more or less as whole cranberries weigh more than a gram) and then put them into the larger bowl. Replace the empty bowl onto the scale and re-tare so the scale shows zero.
Feta Cheese: Measure out 30 grams of crumbled feta in your dish. Don’t place the feta into the large bowl but set it aside as you will want to add it last.
Make your dressing.
Place a medium size mixing bowl on the scale.
Pour in 41 grams of fig balsamic vinegar.
Pour in 15 grams of lemon olive oil
Remove bowl from scale and whisk using a wire whisk briskly until ingredients are fully emulsified, i.e. thick, creamy, and not separating.
(Note that I tend to go light on dressing. Many side dish customers wanted a little more dressing and for them I would add extra on the side. For the dressing rich flavor increase the amount of each ingredient by 50%. Just note that this will affect the nutrition information.)
Assemble your side dish.
By now your quinoa should be nice and cool, so it is time to bring all of the ingredients together.
Mix the dressing into the quinoa until thoroughly mixed. This ensures that the dressing is fully distributed but prevents your other ingredients from becoming over processed via mixing.
Add in all of the other ingredients and mix lightly so that they are well distributed.
Add the feta cheese last and just toss lightly so it stays in crumbled pieces and does not mash into the dish but is still distributed throughout.
Nutrition info.
