Curried Pearl Barley Salad

This month for the Secret Recipe Club I was really happy to be paired with Heather from Fit Mama Real Food as, like me, she’s just had a baby and so I enjoyed reading her posts about her birth story and other baby-related topics.  In fact, I had to keep telling myself that I was looking for a recipe to make, not just reading her blog for fun!  Luckily, the recipes on her blog are also exactly the type of things I like to make.   I was so spoilt for ideas but in the end decided to make a salad as I don’t have much time to make fun things at the moment and it would be perfect for my lunch and would also keep in the fridge for the next day too.  I chose Heather’s Curried Grain Salad which she had made as a side dish, but suggested adding tuna or chickpeas to make it into a main meal.  I decided to add red kidney beans as I felt the colour would stand out against the rather dull coloured grain. Other changes included the type of grain.  Heather used a mixture of rice and a spelt-like grain but I decided to use pearl barley.   I also toasted the sunflower seeds and reduced the quantities of everything by about half.  The finished result was really tasty.   The curry taste is fairly subtle and you could use a stronger curry powder or add a little extra sprinkling of powder at the end if you wanted a more pronounced flavour.   To see Heather’s original recipe and other delicious-looking recipes such as lentil feta salad and nutella surprise balls, (the fun stuff I referred to above) which I hope to make soon, then please have a look at her blog.

Ingredients – serves 2

1 cup pearl barley

1 cup red grapes, halved

1 stalk of celery, diced

1 tsp curry powder

Salt

Black Pepper

1 tbsp sunflower seeds

200g can kidney beans

1 tbsp extra virgin olive oil

How to Make Curried Pearl Barley Salad

1. Rinse the barley throughly then add it to a saucepan with the curry powder and 2 cups of water.  Bring to the boil and simmer for 45 minutes.  If the pan goes dry add a little more water.   Leave to cool.

2. Toast the sunflower seeds in a dry frying pan.

3. Mix all the ingredients together and serve.

To see what other SRC participants have made, click on the link below.

 

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