Teymoor Enjoys Healthy Snacking
This is part of our yearlong Family Eats Challenge series. Throughout the year, we’ll take a journey with four families as they strive to change their relationship with the food they eat. For this Challenge, we visit with Teymoor, a single male, living in San Francisco. Helping Teymoor with the Challenge is Chef Ross Rosenzweig, the Culinary Coach for Berkeley-based VittlesInc.
When we last left Chef Ross and Teymoor, it was time for Teymoor to heed Chef Ross’ advice on how to create some healthy snacks to take to work. Chef Ross provided a variety of recipes, including Asian Cabbage Wraps, California Rolls, Teriyaki Chicken Temaki, Beer Braised Turkey Tacos with Mango Tomato Salsa, and a Pineapple Mango Salsa All were relatively easy to prepare, but they did take a bit of pre-planning.
Here is what Teymoor had to say:
All the recipes Chef Ross provided me looked pretty easy to make, but I choose the Teriyaki Chicken Temaki Hand Rolls to start off with. For the most part, the ingredients needed were typical ones I have, such as soy sauce, chicken and rice. The English cucumbers weren’t something I usually buy and I was unable to find the Shirakiki Unagi sauce at our local store.
As for the teriyaki sauce, I don’t use it, and therefore didn’t have any at home, so instead I made up a sauce as a substitute for the teriyaki, which included sesame oil, light soy and sugar.
Because pre-wrapping the hand rolls makes the seaweed soggy, I found that packing the filling and wrapping them at work is best. I packed the ingredients in plastic containers to transport them to work. Once there, I found the wraps were relatively easy to assemble at snack time, especially since I had all the ingredients ready and waiting to go. There was no hassle in storing, assembling or eating. The rolls were very filling and quite tasty.
As usual, Ross has great ideas and tips. The Challenge is definitely helping me, and serving as a great catalyst to get me cooking.
Chef Ross’ next Task for Teymoor: Quinoa
Teymoor asked me if he could learn how to make the ubiquitous quinoa. So I developed this recipe for him that shows how versatile it is just by changing an ingredient or two.
Quinoa is a complete protein, offering essential amino acids. It is a perfect substitute for rice, adding variety to a meal. What is also great about quinoa is that it has more than twice the amount of protein found in rice. And, because it is easy to digest, this is a very agreeable grain.
This salad is a sure fire hit. It is even better the next day.
Quinoa Salad With Baked Breaded Chicken
Rinse your quinoa, then steam or cook the quinoa covered on your cooktop for about 15 minutes. It is done when it is soft enough to eat, but still has a firm texture.
For the quinoa, I used red quinoa. Color doesn’t matter regarding flavor but I do like the contrast of the red in this dish. I also steamed the golden beets but roasting is just fine.
I used a frozen pre-breaded chicken product that is quite tasty, but you can use your favorite breaded chicken recipe, if desired.
To make the dressing, start with a 3 second pour of red wine vinegar, and a 5 second pour of blood orange olive oil, and a 3 second pour of Ponzu sauce to taste (see ingredients notes below).
I like to start my dressing here, taste it, then adjust. It should be perky, but shouldn’t make you pucker. The feta you will add later will help to further make this salad irresistible.
To vary the dish, there are a variety of mix-ins that can be used: lemon thyme (one of my current favorites to play with), sheep feta, and wild baby arugula. Although not in these pictures, avocado and cucumber provide great textural contrast, too. Lemon thyme is the only mix-in that is a necessity in this recipe.
Ingredient Notes:
Ponzu sauce is a citrus-based sauce that has a sweet, sour, slightly salty flavor.
Lemon thyme looks like English thyme, but it smells and tastes like lemon.
Blood Orange Oil is a mixture of the juice from blood oranges with olive oil. Delicious in a vinaigrette, or on chicken and fish.
