Beans for Protein

A meat free meal once or twice a week is recommended by many dietitians. We use beans, on those meat free days, to give us the protein we need to keep our bones and muscles developing properly.

One of my favourite recipes is so simple and so easy to have in the fridge for a day or two making meal preparation easier.

I use one can of Chick Peas (Garbonzo beans) or a can of mixed beans also works well. Wash beans well and add:

Any or all kinds of fruit (cantalope or apples or both are nice) cubed bean sized and to an equal volume to the beans.

OR

All kinds of veggies. (onions, peppers of all colours, celery, tomatos, stem of broccoli, stem of cauliflower, cucumber...anything you have in your fridge) to an equal volume as the beans.

Both of these recipes give you the crisp cool juicy texture of the fruit or veggis in contrast to the soft bean textures.

you can use anything you want for a dressing but we try to be very low fat here so we use fresh lemon juice and salt and pepper to taste. Leaving the salad to set in the fridge for a couple hours before serving allows the tastes to blend. If your going to add oil to the dressing Olive Oil or Canola Oil are the healthiest oils to use.