Lime, Mint and Olive Quinoa Salad

Take a helping of one of my favourite Sierra Leonean side dishes – aka groun soup (with a lime and onion base). Add in a dash of the Lebanese food I also grew up with. Then top it up with some quinoa. And there you have it.

A minty lime olive quinoa salad.

The quinoa really does carry these flavours very well.  And it can be prepared in advance and chilled for a quick brunch or supper side dish. I reckon it would be fab served alongside some homemade Labneh and pitta bread. I meant to have the salad you see in the picture with some sweet roasted butternut squash and lamb. But I just took a break from food photography, sat down and ate it all. Just like that. Well, apart from the 1 tsp I saved for OH’s to taste test.

This is the second recipe in my pantry staple spotlight on quinoa. Please be sure to check the other quinoa recipes out.

How to cook quinoa.

Lemon, lime and herb couscous.

Strawberry and caramelised onion salad.

I am adding this recipe to the Betta Living vegetarian recipe competition which is aiming to help us celebrate National Vegetarian Week during the 19-25th of May.

This is suitable for the 5:2 diet as one portion is approx 152 calories if serving six or 227 calories if serving four.

5 from 3 votes

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Lime, Mint and Olive Quinoa Salad

A tasty gluten free salad with quinoa, mint, lime and olives.

Cook Time 20 minutes

Author Recipes from a Pantry

Ingredients

For the quinoa:

• 170 g (1 cup) quinoa
• 480 ml (2 cups) water or stock
• 1 tsp olive oil
• Salt optional

Everything else:

• A large handful of fresh mint
• A quarter of a small red onion
• 6 radishes
• 2 to matoes
• 16 olives
• 2-3 tbsp lime juice to your taste
• 1 tbsp olive oil
• Salt
• ground black pepper

Instructions

1. First cook the quinoa.
2. Pour the quinoa into a fine mesh sieve.
3. Rinse under a running tap and thoroughly wash the quinoa (rubbing through it with your fingers) for 3 mins to remove any bitter outer coating.
4. Let the quinoa drain for a few mins to remove the excess liquid.
5. Place the quinoa into a pot and add in the water, oil and salt and bring to the boil.
6. Reduce to a simmer, cover and let cook for 15 mins - you will see tiny spirals (aka the germ) coming out of the seeds.
7. Remove the quinoa from the heat, open and fluff the grains and let stand for about 10 mins.
8. Finely chop the mint, red onion, radishes, tomatoes and halve the olives.
9. Then mix these in to the cooled quinoa along with the lime juice and olive oil.
10. Adjust seasoning and serve.

Recipe Notes

You can add more or less herbs, lemon juice etc.