Quinoa salad with halloumi cheese

One of my favorite heavenly summer meals -- once tomatoes come back to the farmers market: Quinoa!

I dress it with lemon, garlic oil, fresh parsley and mint, and toss it with fresh tomatoes, steamed green beans, red pepper, zucchini (and whatever other fresh spring and summer veggies look good. Then I brown some halloumi in a skillet and place on top.

Perfect mix of savory, sweet, salty, herby and garlicky.

To make quinoa meals even quicker, I'll cook up a big batch in the rice cooker and freeze in zip-top bags in 1-cup portion sizes.

Then it's easy to toss quinoa into anything: chili, spaghetti, salad, casseroles, etc.

You'll find halloumi in the cheese department of specialty and natural foods stores. It's salty and squeaky with a thread of mint, and as you can see from the picture, it browns instead of melts when you grill or saute it. Yum.