Lunch in a Box: Farro Salad with Spinach and Sun-Dried Tomatoes

It's a plant strong week in our household! After 3 nights of baking sweets, and overindulging on Saturday, I was ready to get back to the basics. I <briefly> entertained the idea of adding chicken to our diet this week after tasting some really delicious kebobs on Saturday night, but when it came to pulling the trigger, I just couldn't do it. I'm so conflicted about eating meat when I know the conditions it's been raised in. So I pulled a 180 on Hank and went flat out vegan on my weekly HEB visit.

I decided to keep it really simple this week, and rather than pulling together a bunch of recipes, we're just eating a ton of fresh fruit and vegetables, and plenty of beans and whole grains. It really is as easy as it sounds when you throw out the notion that each meal has to have a certain amount of x,y,z. For example, on Sunday night we ate roasted okra and roasted spaghetti squash with an avocado "cream" sauce. Just put a bunch of clean food on your plate, and you really don't have to worry about a thing.

I found the recipe for the Farro Salad on the Cooking Canuk blog, and used it for our lunches on Monday/Tuesday. I had spinach that needed to be used, fresh basil sitting on the counter, and sun-dried tomatoes in the freezer (you never know when they will come in handy), so it was a piece of cake to throw together. I used the whole bag of farro and it made about 5 1-cup servings (perfect for 2 girl, and 2 guy portions).

I modified the dressing and only used 1 Tb of olive oil.
Spread out over 4 servings, it keeps the calorie/fat count down.

I rounded out the meal with leftover roasted spaghetti squash from the night before, and a clementine (on Tuesday I switched the fruit to grapes). The squash is topped with a little dollop of cilantro chutney that gives a good spicy flavor to the squash. This is one of Hank's favorite condiments and comes in handy on many occasions.

Check out the blog post for the actual recipe, and give it a try. I found it tasty and filling, and think it would be good warm or cold (I heated mine up). And please feel free to share any easy, go-to things you like to pack in your lunch.