Saturday, March 08, 2008

Back! And bearing a quinoa salad offering!



Hi, everyone!

After a long LONG absence, I'm back! A few folks emailed inquiring when I'd be posting again... I was extremely busy - what with moving to a new country, starting a new job, getting a new home together - and didn't do much cooking. Things are beginning to settle down, so I'll do my best to start cooking delicious, healthy food again.

These days, I'm hailing from the beautiful city of San Francisco, where I shop for my vegetables in several wonderful places: the Valencia Farmers Market, a little grocery shop full of healthy wonders and devoid of pretension; the Noe Valley Farmers Market, close to my house, where every Saturday is like a block party of meeting neighbors, listening to local musicians, and seeing new and exciting vegetables; and the Civic Center Farmers Market, which happens every Wednesday close to work.

The beauty of shopping in farmers market need hardly be explained to those who have incorporated the experience into their daily routine. Somehow, the vegetables feel so much more alive when they are out in the open, sold by the people who lovingly grow them, and generate fun conversation and recipe exchanges among neighbors. There are always people selling ready-made healthy foods; in Civic Center, I can always get interesting salads and fun vegan, wheatless "lasagnas" from the young and enthusiastic crew of Alive!, and on Saturdays I enjoy fresh juices and fantastic tempeh burritos from Lisa, Paul and their crew of helpers from Juicey Lucy. Lisa is a fabulous person, and I recently got to know her and some of her family and friends while going on a ten-day juice fast.

The juice fast was a fabulous experience; I feel wonderful, and am as committed as I ever was to eating healthy and organic. It was almost difficult to go back to eating again; but, fortunately, this city really lures one into eating wonderful foods, so the difficulty was short-lived.

My schedule these days makes it difficult to cook much at home, but I do make fun stuff sometimes. Watch this space for reports about delicious wraps and date-nut rolls with raisins and coconut, and today, here's a quick recipe for a quinoa salad, which reminds me a little of tabouleh.

1/2 cup quinoa (white or brown, or mixed)
6 fresh celery stalks
1/2 cup fresh parsley
juice from 1/2 lemon

Cook quinoa in 1.5 cups water until ready; leave in pot to cool a bit. Chop celery and parsley into tiny bits. Mix with quinoa and lemon.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Love your blog and recipe! If you want to juice fast and raw vegan cleanse out east please visit us in New York at American Yogini. Would love to have such a knowledgable guest as you to share with us.
-mary
http://www.americanyogini.com

Hadar said...

Thanks, Mary!

Shunra said...

First, welcome back!

Second, now I've got you on my RSS feed, I won't miss anymore posts (I would have truly enjoyed these as you wrote 'em... ...no that I didn't enjoy them when I got to them, in a single, large dose!)

Third... I'll comment individually on on-topic entires. Welcome to SF, you're almost close enough to send a carrier pigeon, now!

Hadar said...

Hey, hey, hey! Good to hear from you!
Yes, it's good to be back. The busy life in the city is, unfortunately, making me cook somewhat less than I used to it Tel Aviv. But occasionally I make stuff that is worth writing about. And, as a bonus, there may be restaurant reviews.