By Puja Thomas-Patel • March 31, 2013

Our friends, M and V, came over for a visit with their son and bull dog this weekend. Steve and I used to hang out with M all the time when we were in college but haven’t seem him and his wife much since. So when we heard they’d be visiting we were super excited. We had a great time, even our dog, Xar, had fun visiting with them and was on her best behavior, even though she can be a little territorial of our apartment around other dogs.

Their little bull dog was so tired from the sight seeing that she was perfectly happy to sleep in her kennel when we were hanging out at home. Xar would walk to the guest room door and sniff every few minutes. She knew there was another dog sleeping in there.

On Saturday, Steve and I had some work to do so our guests went sightseeing in Old Town and we planned to meet them for dinner there. I had a little time in the afternoon and wanted to make a quick healthy lunch for us since we had a big Mexican feast planned for later and I wanted to get a post done this weekend.

I dug around our pantry and came up with this meal using some quinoa, a few vegetables we had on hand and some Indian spices. My mom would make something like this with rice, but quinoa makes for a tasty substitute with more protein and less starch. It’s healthy, hearty and super easy to make!