Now, more than ever, my basic hippie bowl formula is the way to make your life easier as you contemplate what to make with your dwindling grocery reserves.
Green + grain + protein
I typically opt for some kind of lettuce for the green category: kale, cabbage, spinach, whatever. But you could choose whatever you want. Peas, collards, asparagus…go crazy! In this case broccoli was the winner.
My pantry is a bulk bin heaven, with everything from amaranth to farro to quinoa. I legit think I have over 5 kinds of rice. Anyway, pick the grain you have on hand. I used barley here.
The protein category has the most wiggle room. It could be as simple as canned beans or chickpeas, or as involved as home made shredded chicken. If you don’t feel like meat, you could try nuts, seeds, cheese, tofu, tempeh or edamame. If you don’t have time, you could use canned tuna or salmon.
If you feel like making the effort, a good sauce can take it in a number of directions. An ginger soy miso sauce could take your hippie bowl in an Asian direction…while a cilantro lime chili sauce would work nicely with a Mexican themed bowl. I was feeling the Mediterranean flavors so I went with a lemon tahini sauce.
For the sauce, I blended together: 1/3 cup tahini, 2 tbsp warm water, 2 tbsp olive oil, 2 cloves roasted garlic, 2 tbsp fresh meyer lemon juice, salt and pepper.
As soon as it was mixed up, I tossed it with the cooked barley and some golden raisins. The golden raisins need time to plump up, so the sauce and the hot grains help with that.
Meanwhile, I was working on the broccoli. I wanted them to be super small – almost the same size as the barley – so that it was like a barley dish rather than a broccoli dish.
So I blitzed the florets in the food processor in batches until they were small.
Then I cooked them on high heat in a saute pan with olive oil and tamari.
Once cooked, I tossed them with the tahini coated grains and golden raisins.
Then I added a can of white beans.
And topped it all in toasted slivered almonds.
Kyle and the kids were going BONKERS over this.
It was hilarious to me because I kinda thought it up on a whim an hour before making it because I hadn’t thawed meat in time.
It just goes to show you, the pantry is where it’s at! The only fresh thing in the dish was the broccoli, which you could easily swap for frozen broccoli, or cauli, or x, y, z.
Don’t dismiss frozen veggies!
I still have four pint jars of lemon juice that I squeezed and sealed last month with the remaining lemons from my friend’s tree. Meyer lemons are so sweet!
I would also like to note how impressive it is that I have any left at all given how much lemon juice I go through with all the lemon miso dressing I make for my fave grain salads.
Anyway.
This salad is the ish but feel free to tweak it with what you have on hand because the whole point of this post is to show you that you can make it work! Quarantine meals don’t have to be elaborate to be delicious and you don’t have to settle for random stuff. Making composed dishes is as simple as the formula.
Broccoli, Barley, Bean & Tahini Bowl
Ingredients:
- 1 lb broccoli
- 1 tbsp tamari
- 1 tbsp olive oil
- 1 1/2 cups uncooked barley
- 1 can white cannellini beans
- 1/2 cup golden raisins
- 1/2 cup roasted slivered almonds
- 1/3 cup tahini
- 2 tbsp warm water
- 2 tbsp olive oil
- 2 tbsp lemon juice
- 2 cloves roasted garlic
- salt and pepper
Directions:
Working in batches as needed, pulse broccoli in a food processor until they are small pieces.
Saute in a pan with olive oil and tamari on high heat, tossing minimally, until blackened and fully cooked.
Prepare barley with a pinch of salt in a 1:2 grain to water ratio until fluffy.
Make tahini sauce and add to a large serving bowl with the golden raisins. Once the barley is done, add that, as well as the beans and mix. Before serving, fold in the broccoli and top with slivered almonds.
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