The last few days have been sort of hectic. My freelance work picked up, and yesterday I found myself in back-to-back conference calls from around 11am to 4pm. Now normally, these calls aren’t too bad because I can just sort of plug away at whatever project I’m working on while I half listen to the twenty other people on the call. The only thing I have to remember is to make sure I take my phone off of mute before I respond to someone. There’s nothing like replying to a question and having no one except for your dogs hear you.
Yesterday, on the other hand, I was either giving a presentation or had to be actively involved in the conversations. There was one point where I found myself explaining something on one call, while trying to prepare for my next call, while responding to a co-worker on gchat, as I typed an email. It was at this time that I also discovered Olive, who I had let out of her crate to sit next to me, was eating the beach towel I had put on the floor for her. This was because she had already peed on her dog bed for the 3rd time this week. The two other accidents (yes, five total) were more conveniently on the hardwood floors. And all of these little mishaps were after she had just been outside an hour before. House-trained? Apparently not.
By the time 4pm rolled around and I had wrapped up all of my calls, cleaned up dog pee, and Olive had ingested the equivalent of a small hand towel, I was more than ready for lunch. I prepped a big batch of quinoa salad earlier in the week, knowing full well that if I didn’t make something in advance, I’d likely be eating almond butter straight out of the jar, too frazzled to deal with putting it on bread.
But this salad? A few bites into it and everything was right with the world again. The crunchy almonds, salty olives, sweet raisins, fresh tomatoes, and bright lemon – it has that awesome sweet/savory thing going for it and lots of different textures. It’s very much what Aaron likes to call “Amanda food”.
And despite today being another crazy work day, although with far less conference calls (fingers crossed), I know I have lunch to look forward to and the weekend not too shortly after. It’s the small things.
- 1¼ C. Uncooked Quinoa
- 2½ C. Vegetable Broth (I like the Better than Bouillon brand)
- ½ Pint Grape Tomatoes, sliced in half
- ½ C. Sliced Olives (I used kalamata)
- ⅓ C. Raisins
- ⅓ C. Roughly Chopped Almonds (I used raw, unsalted)
- ¼ C. Chopped Fresh Parsley
- Zest of 1 Lemon
- ½ Tbs. Freshly Squeezed Lemon Juice
- Salt & Pepper to taste
- Rinse the quinoa under cold water, drain, and add it to a medium pot.
- Pour the vegetable broth over the quinoa.
- Leave the pot uncovered, turn the heat to high, and bring it to a boil.
- Once boiled, reduce the heat to low, cover, and simmer for approximately 15 minutes until all of the liquid has been absorbed and the quinoa is tender.
- Once cooked, transfer the quinoa to a large bowl and add the grape tomatoes, olives, raisins, almonds, parsley, and lemon zest and juice.
- Toss everything to combine and season with salt and pepper.
- Enjoy warm or cold!
P.S. If you’re looking for an easy homemade candy recipe for Easter, I highly recommend some peppermint patties. This recipe is one of my absolute favorite desserts, sugar and all!
{ 15 comments… read them below or add one }
this recipe looks amazing!! i cant wait to try it!
Thanks, Kimberly! Let me know what you think of it if you do!
I can relate all too well to that frantic conference call while the dog is doing something she shouldn’t panic… Ginger’s thing is to sleep the entire day until the second I get on the phone for work. Then she decides that’s the exact moment she needs to go outside and so I have to sleekly put the phone on speaker, talk loud enough so it sounds like I’m still next to the phone and run to the front door to let her out. I swear if there were hidden cameras in our houses we’d make a great reality show about the wonders of working from home!
So funny! Yesterday I gave Olive a chew toy to keep her entertained while I was on one of my calls, but I had to take it away because she was making these awful noises that sounded like something from The Walking Dead. And of course, this was all happening as I’m talking to a client, muting the phone so I can yell “down” at Olive. It makes me nervous that the mute button is just going to stop working one of these days.
It sounds like you had a lot to juggle! This salad looks like a delightful one-pot kind of meal that’s perfect for those days. Sorry to hear about Olive’s mishaps. Hopefully she’ll get the hang of it soon!
I think Olive’s entered that adolescent stage where they start testing their boundaries (kind of like kids). The trainer we’re working with warned us it would happen…hopefully we can nip it in the bud. The whole peeing in the house thing is getting very old!
Those teens… They think, “Well, you can pee in the house! Why can’t I?”
hahaha I’m going to think of your comment the next time Olive has an accident!
Yum! I’m all about quinoa salads lately, and olives. I just discovered the bulk olives at my grocery store and it has been my go to snack! I love the wooden bowl too, need to get me one of those!
Thanks, Julia! The bowl is from Crate & Barrel!
Delicious! Ever since going to Morocco a few years ago dishes like this have surfaced in our house a lot more frequently.
I would love to visit Morocco!
This quinoa salad DOES look like the perfect blend of textures and flavors. And just the right thing for eating your feelings without the guilt
Those growing puppies can be so darned frustrating! They know better but start doing all the wrong stuff, just for funsies.
This was delicious! I also added fresh mint and fresh chives….yummy!!
That sounds great! I love fresh mint!
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