Quinoa saves the day!

So we have just about successfully made it through our first week. 

This week was good but a little tough because of the Vancouver Folk Festival!  It was an amazing weekend of music, sunshine, ocean and dancing (plus sunburns sadly).  We discovered some great new (to us) bands too; Good For Grapes (Vancouver locals), Bette and Wallet (from the east), Canailles (from Montreal), and The Cave Singers (Washington).  You should check them out for some soul food for sure!  Of course Ani Defranco, Hey Rosetta and Dan Mangan were amazing as well. 

For us going to events like this is wonderful for a number of reasons and food happens to be one of them.  We love the unique vendors they usually get to come out, Ecuadorian Food, Sweet potato fries, Chickpea flour pakora, lots of Italian food and of course mini donuts.  This weekend we really did not want to waver on our health commitments and we knew it would be really tough.  Those foods may be a treat sometime in the future but not for this year.  One of the things that saved us in our will power was packing celery, carrots, nuts and a quinoa salad. We brought just enough for us to eat up so it wouldn't get all warm and it was super satisfying.  We thought we would share this salad with you in case you find yourself in a simular situation.

We love quinoa.  It is hearty, super nutritious and very tasty.  We make a cold salad packed with whatever veggies we have in the fridge at that time.  This weekend we had peppers, kale, cucumbers, asparagus, dandelion greens, cabbage and carrots.  You rinse the quinoa really good and cook it just like rice; 1 part quinoa to 2 parts water and let it cool overnight.  The dressing that I have been making tonnes of right now (mostly because it is cleanse friendly) is 2 parts olive (or grapeseed) oil, 1 part Braggs soy sauce (wheat free), 1 part freshly squeezed lemon juice and whatever seasonings you want to add.  This weekend I added some Tahini and garlic and it was super. 

There were rough patches where we just about bought salted caramel ice cream (oh yum). 
After thinking very hard we realized we have to take this one day at a time and at that moment, on that day we decided we didn't need it. 

I have broken the "no coffee" rule.  I am officially drinking decaf (when available) black coffee once a day.  I cannot foresee a year without coffee cold turkey so I will slowly limit it to less than once a day but too much change at once left me lacking some of my willpower. 

I don't want to sound overly positive.  We are struggling but we have had some successes.  Getting through a festival weekend without buying icecream is something we are taking as a victory. 

Here is a link for some info on quinoa if you are interested in learning more.
http://www.whfoods.com/genpage.php?dbid=142&tname=foodspice

Talk to you soon.
Corie and Ian