Edamame Beans and Quinoa – Soy Tasty!
What is with our thing for super foods? Will edamame beans really save our lives? Are blueberries rich in antioxidants in our bodies, as well test tubes? Is there actual human data to prove this? I have to be frank and say that I am not a super food fan. Just regular old foods for me, please. As I see it, most of the super foods blather is nothing but malarky. I won’t be using the term any longer. Consider it a new dietary intolerance – I just won’t tolerate super foods. You can use this line at parties like my friends who say they are allergic to sex. Both are lines that can’t be ignored. You could also try Ooh the mental bloating that these super foods cause. I just can’t tolerate them. That is an attention getter, too.
Don’t get me wrong, the nutrition information for all foods should be available to everyone as should help understanding what that information means and how that information can be used to create a healthy diet. Touting super foods as silver bullets on their own doesn’t really help anyone. Since eating any given super food on its own won’t guarantee you anything, I am just considering every food normal and I am going to eat more broadly by simply choosing a larger variety of foods (we eat something like an average of only 20 different foods in our diets – BORING!). From now on it is a huge variety of regular foods that will be made super duper tasty.
Two regular foods that go great together in a super duper tasty way are edamame beans and quinoa. This is not exactly a surprise. Since the dawn of mankind, grains and beans have been a great pairing. Neither has that much flavor, so they make a great foundation for a variety of salads. The grain/bean salad format is a timeless classic that is not only easy to make, but it can be made in so many ways that you never really run out of ideas.
Here is how I make my super duper tasty salad from the regular foods edamame beans and quinoa.
- 1 cup of quinoa
- 1 cup of cooked edamame, frozen is fine.
- 1 small sweet onion
- 1 small green apple
- 1/4 cup of dried cranberries
- 4 oz. of blue cheese
- 1 small bunch of parsley, about 1/2 oz.
- 6 tbsp of olive oil
- 2 tbsp apple cider vinegar
- salt and pepper
- Fill a medium pot with enough water to cover the quinoa. Bring the water to boil. When the water boils add the quinoa and cook until tender 10-12 minutes. Drain the quinoa and set aside to cool.
- Peel and dice the onion into small dice.
- Peel (optional) the apple and cut it into small dice or julienne.
- Coarsley chop the parsley.
- In a small bowl, whisk together the oil and vinegar. Season with salt and pepper.
- In a large bowl, mix the quinoa, edamame, apple, and cranberries.
- Break up the blue cheese into small chunks and mix them into the salad.
- Drizzle the salad with the oil and vinegar.
- Check seasoning and adjust it to taste with salt and pepper.
- Serve at room temperature or cold.
- Just about any decent vinaigrette can be used in this salad. For a spicier version, add a small amount of wasabi or harissa to the vinaigrette. Other cheeses, like feta or goat cheese, can also be used.
Keep Eating! Keep Innovating!
Do you like edamame beans? Can you tolerate super foods? Let us know all about it in the comments or on Facebook.
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