Will Run For Pomegranate, Kale & Quinoa Salad

pomegranate, kale & quinoa salad.

Lessons that I've learned this week.  Don't casually tell people that you have a "quivery liver".  They become alarmed.  Similarly, don't tell people that you are having liver salad.  They become disgusted (unless they are my grandmother and think liver and onions are just the greatest thing).

  After a trip to the emergency room a few weeks ago and some blood work it seems that my liver isn't quite itself.  My doctor isn't quite sure why.  So until my next doctor's appointment I decided to self diagnose (with the help of google): "quivery liver". Treatment: eat lots of kale and other liver friendly foods such as beets, blueberries, etc..

Even if you aren't a kale lover this salad is worth a try because who doesn't love blueberries, pomegranate, pepitas, hemp hearts, beets, balsamic vinegar & maple syrup.  Yum!

Salad

(serves 4-6 kale lovers)

1 bunch dinosaur kale (chopped into small pieces...think Edward Scissor Hands)

1/2 C chopped fresh parsley

2 small beets shredded

1 C fresh blueberries

1 1/2 C pomegranate seeds

2 C cooked red and white quinoa (any colour will do)

1/4 C toasted pepitas

2 T hemp hearts

Combine all salad ingredients in a large bowl. 

Dressing

1/4 C olive oil

1/4 C white balsamic vinegar

1T maple syrup

Whisk all dressing ingredients together and drizzle over kale salad.  The longer the salad sits the more delicious it becomes. 

Cuddle break for Lenore & Jeb

Will Run For Almond & Chocolate Chip Quinoa Cookies

happy second breakfast

Last week over snacks with team spartan quinoa cookies came up.   I'll pretend it was an, "oh my,  quinoa cookies would be so delicious" conversation instead of a "what in the world are quinoa and cacao nibs and where do you find these strange things" kind of conversation.

For the record there was a run involved as well.  Long Limbs Rowlinson has been posting some pretty fast couch to 5K times and we wanted to see how she was doing.  Fine.  Truth be told we wanted to see if we were going to embarrass ourselves on actual race day.

If anything was embarrassing it was the way that we were walking after our 18K run today.  Walking is a term that I used loosely.  Hobbling would probably be more accurate.

On that note these cookies make a great second breakfast cookie or a post run cookie.

Chocolate Chip Quinoa Cookies

(6 cookies plus one sample cookie)

1 C ground oats

1/2 C ground quinoa

1/2 tsp baking soda

2 T brown sugar

2 T chocolate chips

1 T cocoa nibs

2 T chopped almonds

4 T unsweetened soy milk (or milk of your choice)

1/2 tsp vanilla bean paste

2 T olive oil

Preheat oven/baking stone to 375 F.  In your coffee grinder or blender grind 1 C oats and 1/2 C quinoa.  Place ground mixture in a medium sized bowl and add baking soda, sugar, chocolate chips, cocoa nibs, and almonds.  

nibs, chips and nuts

In a small measuring cup combine soy milk, vanilla bean paste and olive oil. 

Add wet ingredients to dry ingredients.  Combine thoroughly.  Dough will seem slightly dry but will stick together.

cookie dough

Form 1/4 C of cookie dough into cookie shapes and bake for 8 minutes.

yum