Today's lunch

[pegkerr]

Red cabbage slaw (mixed with chopped cranberries and tossed with a combination of orange juice, rice vinegar and sugar); quinoa timbales [quinoa and cornmeal cooked in water/orange juice mixture with a little chopped onion--shhhh, don't tell Delia--until liquid is absorbed, add orange zest, cinnamon, cumin, and chopped organic dried apricots; press into a container/mold sprayed with cooking spray (I used one of the small containers from my laptop lunchbox), and pop out of the mold immediately]; endamame and baby carrots; and one of my favorite lunchbox desserts: a mixture of cottage cheese and apple butter.

Comments

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

What's in the quinoa timbales? Are the red bits I see tomato, bell pepper, or something different completely?

[pegkerr.livejournal.com]

Orange zest and chopped dried apricots. The dried apricots are a bit darker than what you usually see in stores because they're organic.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Mmmmm!

[pegkerr.livejournal.com]

There's some cinnamon and cumin in them, too.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

And rightly so.

[rachet.livejournal.com]

Having a severe citric acid allergy, this is a plate of death.

but it looks REALLY good!

Yum

[dreamshark.livejournal.com]

Now I wish I'd taken a picture of MY lunch today, which looked pretty darn good until I saw YOUR picture and got hungry. :-)

[tenantofwildfel.livejournal.com]

Wow, that looks good. Seriously.

I'd like to try making the timbales, but I've never worked with quinoa before. Would you mind posting a more specific recipe?

I've recently returned to working retail (after several years part-time teaching at a local university), and I'm looking for ways to avoid eating burgers at the mall. I recently purchased some good lunch containers ( http://www.fit-fresh.com/products/transportation/lunchonthego.php ) and I'm interested in making some good food that can handle a long drive in the summer, as well as spotty refrigeration at work (which is my reason for buying containers with a built-in ice pack).

Do you have any favorite websites that you could recommend?

Thank you!

[pegkerr.livejournal.com]

Recipe:

Quinoa Amaranth Timbales

Be sure to rinse the quinoa well under running water using a fine sieve; quinoa has a bitter surface coating (a kind of natural insect repellent) that must be rinsed off before use.

Zest and juice of one orange
1 tsp canola oil
1/4 small onion, finally diced (I used less than this, hoping Delia wouldn't notice)
1/2 tsp cumin
1/2 cup quinoa, well rinsed and drained
1/4 cup amaranth (couldn't find this at my co-op, so I used an equal amount of cornmeal)
1/4 tsp salt
1/4 tsp cinnamon
5 dried apricot halves, finely diced
1 TB pine nuts, optional (I didn't include these)

Zest the orange and set zest aside. Juice the orange into a 2-cup liquid measuring cup and add enough water to equal 1 1/2 cups. Set aside.

Heat the oil in a small saucepan. Saute the onion until tender, about 5 minutes. Add cumin and cook 30 seconds, until cumin is fragrant. Add orange juice/water mixture and salt and bring to boil. Remove from heat and slowly add the amaranth, whisking constantly. Add the quinoa and cinnamon and whisk to combine.

Return pan to heat. When water boils, reduce heat to low, cover, and let cook on low heat until all liquid is absorbed and the grains are tender, about 25 minutes (it was about 15 minutes on my stove).

Meanwhile, toast pine nuts in a dry skillet over medium heat, stirring constantly until lightly toasted, about four minutes (watch carefully, because they can burn easily).

When grains are done, stir in the dried apricot, pine nuts, and orange zest. Stir briskly until well incorporated.

Spray your mold(s) with nonstick spray. Pack the quinoa mixture firmly into the mold, the immediately turn it out onto a serving dish or container, tapping on the bottom to help it release.

I'm not vegan, or even vegetarian, but I started using the Laptop Lunchbox when I started reading the blog The Vegan Lunchbox"> [veganlunchbox]. Jennifer McCann is a vegan educator who started this blog making the most exquisite lunches for her son and then photographing them. She made lunches look like fun (something that seemed awfully cool to me, after years of bringing Healthy Choice frozen lunches day after day after day after day . . . . ho hum.) Her cookbook, The Vegan Lunchbox, has sold out, but a new edition is coming out this summer.

You can get lots of ideas for lunches by checking the Flickr groups, Laptop Lunches and Bento Boxes.

Also helpful is the syndicated feed lunch_in_abox2 to Lunch in a Box, which is more Japanese bento-oriented. Check out her site; she has tons of tips about packing lunches in a speedy manner, while keeping food safety in mind.

Hope these sites help!

[tenantofwildfel.livejournal.com]

Thank you! I will look into getting a copy of that book ASAP. According to bordersstores.com, the new edition was scheduled for March 2008, so I should be able to special order it. (My retail job is in a Waldenbooks.)

I will definitely try the timbales--they look wonderful.

[pegkerr.livejournal.com]

Her blog mentioned that her publisher decided to delay publication until summer, reasoning that they want to take advantage of the back-to-school shopping excitement/season. So I'm afraid you'll have to wait a little longer. It's definitely worth it, though. Till then, you'll have the websites to tide you over.

[pegkerr.livejournal.com]

Also, the Laptop Lunchbox itself comes with a recipe book, too, which will give you more ideas.