A beautifully colorful lunch that tastes even better than it looks!
One of the best ways to ensure that you’re getting all of the nutrients your body needs to be healthy and strong is to add a rainbow of natural colors to your diet. Not only are colorful foods loaded with essential vitamins and minerals, but when prepared the right way, they taste amazing, too! Our Mediterranean Quinoa Salad with Seasonal Vegetables packs everything your body needs into one healthy and delicious meal. By combining one of nature’s most perfect superfoods, quinoa, with  seasonal vegetables, like green cucumber, our scrumptious yellow Oven Roasted Corn on the Cob, and red onion, we’ve created a quinoa recipe that is light enough to be enjoyed as a tasty lunch or side dish, but also filling enough to satisfy. We recommend cooking the quinoa for this Mediterranean quinoa dish the night before, so that it has time to chill and helps to cut down on prep time.
For a complete list of superfoods, click here.
Enjoy Mediterranean Quinoa Salad with Seasonal Vegetables with:
Turkey Veggie Burgers
Roasted Shrimp
Spicy Barbecue Chicken
For a “make-ahead” lunch, layer your salad in a 1/2 pint mason jar. Layer in this order: quinoa, parsley, tomatoes, cucumber, onion, and corn. Last, drizzle with our homemade Vinaigrette and refrigerate until ready to eat.
Mediterranean Quinoa Salad with Seasonal Vegetables
Ingredients
- 1 cup red quinoa rinsed well (optional white quinoa)
- 2 cups water optional vegetable broth
Vinaigrette
- 2 teaspoons whole-grain mustard (I used Whole Grain Country Dijon)
- 3 tablespoons lemon juice freshly squeezed
- 1 tablespoon white wine vinegar
- 2 garlic cloves finely minced
- 1/4 teaspoon crushed red pepper flakes
- black pepper freshly ground, to taste
- kosher or sea salt to taste
- 1/2 cup extra virgin olive oil
Vegetables
- 1 cucumber chopped into small chunks (for the cool weather method, use one zucchini in place of the cucumber)
- 1 1/2 cups whole kernel corn cut from the cob, recipe for Easy Oven Roasted Corn on the Cob
- 1 pint cherry tomatoes halved lengthwise or grape tomatoes
- 1 red onion medium, thinly sliced
- 1/2 cup Italian parsley chopped
Instructions
- Bring quinoa and 2 cups water to a boil in a medium pot over high heat. Reduce heat to medium-low, cover, and simmer until quinoa is tender, about 15 minutes. Remove pot from heat and allow to stand, covered, for 5 minutes. Fluff with a fork. Note: I like to cook the quinoa the day before and refrigerate so that it's already cold and prep time is lessened.
Vinaigrette
- In a medium bowl whisk together mustard, lemon juice, white wine vinegar, garlic, red pepper flakes, salt and pepper. Gradually whisk in olive oil. Set aside.
- In a large mixing bowl, combine cucumber, corn, tomatoes, onion, and parsley, and cooled quinoa. Add Vinaigrette to mixture and toss gently. Serve immediately or refrigerate covered until ready to serve.
Roasted Vegetable Method for Cool Weather Months
- Preheat oven to 400 degrees.
- While quinoa is cooking, add zucchini and onions to a medium mixing bowl, add 2 tablespoons vinaigrette and toss to coat. Place zucchini and onions on a 13x9x2" non-stick baking sheet or roasting pan. Spread the vegetables so they are not touching.
- Next, add tomatoes and corn to the same mixing bowl and add 2 tablespoons vinaigrette, toss gently to coat, set aside.
- Roast zucchini and onions, uncovered, for 20 minutes. Stir vegetables and add tomatoes and corn. Continuing roasting until tomatoes collapse, about 10 minutes. Remove vegetables and set aside.
- In a large skillet, over medium-low heat, add quinoa, remaining Vinaigrette, parsley, and additional salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste, simmer 2 minutes. Add roasted vegetables to quinoa, toss to combine and cook an additional 2 minutes.
Notes
Nutrition Information
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Question: If you layering the jar do you roast veggies for this also?
Rosemary, I never roast my veggies. However, some people like to roast them in the cooler months. I've included instructions for both in the recipe. 🙂
Thanks Gale. I am going to try this. I work, so I wanted to put them in the jar for work. Sounds really good.
How do you determine the exact measurements of each ingredient for the mason jar preparation?
Tracy, I recommend eyeballing it. It really depends on how much you prefer of each ingredient. I typically use about 1/4 cup of each.
1/2 cup extra-virgin olive oil?
You can use 1/4 cup or less of extra virgin olive oil, if desired.
This has turned into one of my favorite dishes (even in the Winter months). I started to improvise too, adding other vegetables (carrots, red & orange peppers, broccoli slaw) even substituting the quinoa for couscous. I've determined that by using approx 1/2 of a cup of the quinoa or couscous, 1/4 cup roasted corn and about 1-2 Tablespoons of the vinaigrette, along with the veggies and parsley (which adds such a wonderful flavor to this dish!), it's approx. 350 calories.
Thanks for the awesome recipe SkinnyMs 🙂
For the roasting method, do you chill everything and serve cold or is it served warm? I love Roasted Garlic infused Grape Seed Oil from Wildtree. I love the flavor it adds when using to roast or sautee vegies, shrimp etc. I prefer this over olive oil.
You can serve it either way. Usually it's served cold.
I try to watch my fat intake and this says 15 grams of fat. Why so high? Is it the quinoa? If I know where the fat is sometimes I try to substitute with something else.
Hi Teresa, All the fat is coming from the olive oil.
I asked this already but my comment did not come thru. What if you hate the taste of vinegar. Is there something you can substitute that with? Thanks.
Fresh squeezed lemon juice (or lime juice).
I know it's been a while but, 2 questions… Are you using fresh corn? canned? frozen? Also, you have zucchini listed in the instructions but not in the ingredients list. So we are adding zucchini to the roast? Thanks!
Laura S, Hi. For the cooler weather roasting method, use zucchini and no cucumber. Also for the cooler method, frozen kernel corn can be used rather than a fresh ear of corn. If you wanted to and if it is available, however, you could use corn cut fresh from the cob and roast it that way.
Just made this for lunch for tomorrow, but it's so good I don't want to wait on eating it!
I agree! 🙂
I’m not a fan of mustard, any recommendations for a substitute?
If you’d like to maintain a similar flavor, you can try horseradish. Otherwise, you can omit the mustard, altogether.
Can you recommend a different grain for this salad?
Rochelle, Barley or Millet are both good choices.
What size jar should I get? I don’t eat too much for lunch since i dont get too hungry around midday, but I want to eat something healthy
A pint sized jar should be perfect!
I’ve made this many times for parties and everyone loves it!!