Recipe: Mediterranean Vegetable Salad

Mediterranean vegetable salad with quinoa, lentils & fresh herbs, topped with greek yoghurt & dukkah 

Veggies

Preheat oven to 180 degrees C.

Chop up mediterranean vegetables into similar sized squares, about 2-3cm wide (I used eggplant, pumpkin, zucchini  & red capsicum).

Place into a mixing bowl and drizzle with a little olive oil. Toss the vegetables around so they are lightly coated in the oil.

Place on an oven tray and bake in the oven for 20 – 30 minutes. The larger the size of the squares, the longer they will take in the oven.

Once cooked turn the oven off and leave the veggies in there until serving.

Quinoa

Place about ¼ cup quinoa in a siev and run water over it in the sink.

Place washed quinoa in a small saucepan and fill about halfway with cool tap water.

Bring to the boil on heat and cook until the quinoa goes translucent and is chewy when bitten (about 10 mins).

Drain quinoa.

Lentils

Take 1 x 400g can brown lentils and place in siev, wash with tap water.

Herbs

Take a small handful of some fresh herbs (I used flat leaf parsly, coriander and mint) and break leaves off steams.

Dressing

In a small jar place a couple of tbsps of olive oil and lemon juice. Season with pepper. Place lid on and give it a good shake.

Putting it together

Take a large mixing bowl and in it place the hot veggies, quinoa, lentils, fresh herbs and dressing. Gently toss together with salad servers.

Pour out slowly onto a large flat white plate and serve with a dollop of reduced fat greek or natural yoghurt on top and sprinkle over some dukkah.

This dish is vegetarian, low GI, high in fibreand gluten free. To make it vegan you could serve it without the yoghurt. The quinoa and lentils mean that this dish has a reasonable amount of protein per serve, but if you wanted to increase the protein you could serve it with a poached egg on top instead. Bon appetit!