Recipe Thursday: Quinoa and Kale Patties with Sweet Clementine Vinaigrette

For this week's recipe I thought I'd try something out that I've drooled over on Pinterest. I don't know about anyone else, but despite my love for Pinterest, I have to do it in very small doses so as to avoid feeling like a complete failure at life.

"Why am I not more organized?"

"I should set aside more time for cleaning."

"Why don't I make a recipe from scratch every single day?"

"I think it might be time to buy a house so that I have the space to try out all of these designing ideas."

"I really need to work out more. If I'm not doing 100 burpees every day I'm not reaching my potential."

"How come we don't have more parties? At this rate I'm never going to have the chance to make all these cleverly themed drink and appetizer recipes."

... These thoughts and more are what overcome me every time I get on Pinterest. I always have to give myself a pep talk afterwards to remind myself that I don't completely suck at life.

Anyways, back to the recipe. I've been wanting to try quinoa for months now and I finally built up the courage when I made these delicious quinoa and kale patties. This blogger is clearly a much better photographer than I am so I went light on the pictures, but I couldn't help but take a few:

The ingredients: green onions, parmesan cheese, bread crumbs, garlic, and eggs. I've got the
quinoa cooking in the bottom pot and the kale steaming above it (I was pretty proud of my ability to maximize time, space, and energy with my double boiler!).

Once the quinoa cooks and the kale steams you just mix all of the ingredients together, form into patties, and pan cook. Easy peasy!

As usual, I served the patties atop a bed of lettuce. It makes for such an exciting and satisfying salad.

I was surprised at how much I liked quinoa! It tastes a lot like rice, but it's a little bit lighter. I think I would have been stuffed if I ate the same quantity of rice. The patties were absolutely scrumptious; this was one of those meals where we sat and ate in complete silence for 5 minutes or so because we were so focused on the food.

At a loss as to what to top the salad with, I was forced to pull out my Iron Chef hat and come up with a dressing using the ingredient of the day: clementines. I had just bought a big case of them and thought something sweet might complement the flavors of the patties. I'm proud to present you with an Allison Bussells original:

Sweet Clementine Vinaigrette

1 clementine
3 tbsp olive oil
2 tbsp apple cider vinegar
1 tbsp agave nectar
1 clove of garlic

I didn't expect this to turn out as great as it did so these measurements are approximates because I was just dumping stuff into the blender haphazardly. As with any dressing it's pretty easy to play around with the ingredients to reach your desired flavor. I blended all the ingredients for about 30 seconds and then poured it into a cute little carafe that I saved from some gourmet dressing that I splurged on a while back. I wish that my picture captured the cuteness of the dressing carafe. Shucks.