Time for another Manic Monday Meal. Has a whole week gone by already? It feels like time speeds up when it hits the end of the year. There is always so much to do to round everything off and prepare for the year ahead so this morning when I woke up instead of setting an intention to be productive which feels a little forced for me I set an intention rather to feel flowy. This makes everything feel light and natural and I know by releasing my grip everything will unfold just the way it is meant to.
Today’s Manic Monday Meal is awesome I made it last week for the family and everyone loved it, they weren’t even the slightest bit concerned that there was no meat in it which is a great score for me because I am trying to get everyone to have at least a few vegetarian meals every week. Its healthy, full of flavor and of course easy to make. I adapted Jamie Oliver’s recipe for Blackened Chicken San Fran Quinoa Salad from his cookbook Jamie’s 15 Minute Meals, swopping out the chicken for vegan chilli nut mince.
Nut mince is fantastic it has a vaguely similar texture to mince and you can flavor it with with rich spices like cumin which it really takes on well. It gives the whole dish a nice overall crunch too. Mangoes have just come into season here in Australia and they are pure heaven.
I never used to like mangoes growing up but sometime in last 2 years I started to LOVE them. Maybe it has something to do with living in Queensland where the best mangoes are grown. Its so natural for your body to crave foods that are local to where you live and in season.
We confuse our bodies so much because you take a stroll around the supermarket and no matter what the season, most foods are always available even if that means they have been flown in from half way around the world. Its not exactly natural is it? It makes it that much harder to tap into what intuitively your body really needs.
- 1.5 cups quinoa
- 1 fresh red chilli
- 100g baby spinach
- 4 spring onions
- 1 bunch fresh coriander
- ½ bunch fresh mint
- 1 large ripe mango
- 1 avocado
- 2 limes
- Olive oil
- 50g feta
- 2 cups soaked nuts ( I used equal parts almond flakes and walnuts) soaked for min 30 minutes but up to 6hrs if you have time.
- 2 T soy sauce
- 2T cumin
- 1tsp smoked paprika
- 1 tsp dried oregano
- 1 tsp salt
- ¼ tsp cayenne pepper
- 4 T greek yogurt
- *Optional: ½ punnet of snowpea sprouts
- Put the quinoa in a pan with 3 cups of water and bring to the boil then turn the heat down to medium and allow to simmer for 12 minutes. Then cover and remove from the heat.
- In a food processor combine the spinach, spring onion, coriander and mint (reserving a few leaves of each) and blitz until finely chopped.
- Drain the quinoa and rinse it in a colander under cold water. Then mix it together with the chopped herbs, squeeze the juice of 1 lime over and drizzle with olive oil. Season well with salt and pepper. Spread the mixture out on a serving platter.
- Slice the mango finely and the avocado into chunks and place them over the quinoa
- Strain the nuts and blitz them in the food processor until they form a chunky crumble. Add the spices, soy sauce and juice and zest of 1 lime. Then spoon the nut mince over the quinoa.
- Scatter a finely sliced red chilli over the top, crumble the feta, drizzle the yogurt and scatter the snowpea sprouts and a few coriander leaves over before serving.
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