Warm Grain Salad – Vegan

I’ve recently embarked on an Ayurvedic journey, looking at tweaking my diet and yoga practice to balance my doshas. Ayurveda is an ancient Indian holistic healing system that focuses on bringing your body, mind and spirit into balance in order to maintain and promote good health. Since having my daughter my health has been better than it has been for a long time, however, the underlying fatigue is hard to manage when I can’t guarantee the length and quality of my sleep in the same way I used to. I therefore felt that it was time to make some changes and get a fresh pair of eyes to look at my body as a whole. As a result of this I am currently working on eating a pitta reducing diet, I am making these changes slowly as I’m fitting it around being a mum and so it’s not as simple as throwing myself into it full throttle. It’s been a fantastic chance for me to experience what my clients do when they have a consultation with me. Why they ask the questions they do and what additional support I can offer.

Anyway, enough of me waffling on. Changing the way I eat has given me an excuse to play around with some new recipes and this recipe makes a delicious lunch or evening meal. For the grains I used a bought mix of different grains, but you can use whatever you have in the house.

Ingredients:

Serves 2

• 125g mixed grains
• 1 tsp vegetable stock powder
• 2 tbsp pumpkin seeds
• 2 tbsp sunflower seeds
• 1 tsp ground cumin
• 1tsp ground coriander
• ¼ tsp ground turmeric
• 2 tbsp coconut oil
• 2 courgettes
• 4 large handfuls of spinach
• 2 spring onions

Dressing:

• 1 avocado
• Juice of 1 lime

Method:

1. Cook your choice of grains in stock as per the instructions on the packet
2. Whilst the grains are cooking dry roast the seeds in a frying pan until they are lightly toasted, then set to one side
3. To make the dressing blitz the avocado and lime with a hand blender and set aside
4. 5 minutes before the grains are finished going heat 1 tbsp of coconut oil in a frying pan, add the cumin, coriander and turmeric and heat for about a minute stirring constantly
5. Slice the courgettes and add fry them in the spices until they are tender
6. Slice the spring onions and add them to the frying pan
7. Add the spinach to the frying pan and allow to wilt
8. Drain the grains and stir the dressing through them, serve with the greens and enjoy