Mediterranean Quinoa Salad

I’ve been trying to make a concerted effort to eat healthier recently. Eating healthy these days is always a hit or miss activity. Unfortunately, since Covid, if it’s not easy to cook—”cook” being a very generous term, here—then I’m not putting forth the effort. That’s why I appreciate dishes I can easily throw together.

I used to derive immense joy from cooking, even if it involved rigorous preparation. And that was prior to the pandemic when I actually had to go into an office every day, usually followed by a trip to the building’s private gym after work. Meal planning was definitely more of a thing for me then. Today, not so much.

Because I’m (back to) working from home, I prefer to make meals immediately before consuming them. Usually there are leftovers and I can eat on the meal for a few days, maybe even all week, but I consider that to be the benefit of working in one’s living space. It’s afforded me the opportunity to simplify my routine in ways that, frankly, felt impossible during my brief stint in a commuter job this year.

One of the products that makes this manageable is microwaveable cups of single-serve quinoa. I LOVE mixing various foods with quinoa. While I understand that making a large batch of quinoa, usually cooked in broth for added flavor, might be looked on more kindly, I won’t lie to you and pretend I still do that. (One day, maybe…)

I was brainstorming a healthy quinoa dish to make for lunch a few weeks ago while making my grocery list when I remembered a dish I’d been wanting to try since I’d been working from home the first time. Full disclosure, after adding the initial ingredients of grape tomatoes, feta, and black olives, I solicited ChatGPT for assistance building out the remainder of the recipe. It provided a lot of suggestions, most of them I liked (such as chickpeas and arugula), others (such as red onion—sorry!) not so much. I was skeptical about using ChatGPT for this, but was pleasantly surprised when the ingredients I selected made for a tasty, well-rounded meal.

At first, I was precious about getting the measurements for each ingredient just right when adding them to the bed of quinoa. The first week I fixed this dish for lunch, I added 1/4 cup of each ingredient and a cup of arugula lettuce before topping off with pepper, oregano, and healthy drizzles of olive oil and lemon juice. This was because a) I wanted to get the flavor profile right, but also because b) I’d just seen myself in a bathing suit the weekend before and was feeling anxious about my body. (That’s a story for another day…maybe.) The second week I made this dish for lunch, however, I was much more liberal with portions. Because body anxiety or no, I don’t want to put myself in a headspace where I’m constantly stressing over food and, anyway, constantly measuring out each ingredient is tedious and annoying. So, in other words, I’m lazy.

At any rate, here is the full list of ingredients I used to put together a Mediterranean-style quinoa salad:

• Quinoa (duh)
• Grape (sometimes Cherry) tomatoes (diced)
• Cucumber (I preferred minis {diced})
• Chickpeas
• Black olives (sliced)
• Arugula
• Feta (crumbled)
• Black pepper
• Dried Oregano
• Olive oil
• Lemon juice

As aforementioned, once I slice and dice my ingredients to satisfaction, I just start tossing things together. Mind you, the black olives I buy already sliced, because who wants to do that? I usually start with the quinoa, though, and then add tomatoes, cucumber, chickpeas, olives, then the arugula (which I like to tear up into smaller pieces first), and lastly the feta before topping with seasonings and dressings.

The first time I made this, I did not use enough lemon juice and did not add any black pepper. Maybe you can live without it but cracked black pepper is a salad staple of mine. And be generous with the lemon juice, even if you’re not wild about lemon. When mixed with the olive oil, I felt it brought out a nice, balanced flavor.

And there you have it, folks. My only issue with this meal is that I usually am incapable of utilizing all of the ingredients within the week and by Friday the arugula is noticeably wilted (but not so much that I won’t still eat it—groceries are expensive, girl!). While I’m not good at eating healthy ALL of the time, I have found this recipe to be a nice reset when I need to wipe my dietary slate clean.