Buddha Bowl: Rebranding Leftovers

Not for today's kids: old fashioned tuna casserole

Growing up, my mother made a lot of casseroles. She took leftover meat, usually chicken, and combined it with vegetables nearing the end of their shelf life, a can of cream of mushroom soup (undiluted) and dumped it into a dish. She topped this with fried onions from a can, or cornflake crumbs, stuck it in the oven, and voila, dinner.

No wonder my generation hated leftovers.

Foodie millennials simply renamed leftovers and created grain bowls, or Buddha bowls. The Buddha bowl means you have a happy rounded tummy after dinner.

Not that these bowls have to be made with leftovers. Or meat, for that matter. They are quite filling with a combo of grains, veggies and some delicious space you've whipped up.

I made fresh quinoa to pair with a few veggie odds and ends I had on hand: roasted peppers, beet greens, posted cauliflower and sun dried tomatoes. I added chickpeas for protein and black olives for umami.

Then I made a quick lemon tahini sauce: juice form half a lemon, a few chopped up bits of preserved lemon, a hit of cumin and smoked paprika and some olive oil and tahini. Since I prefer cooked beet greens and warm roasted veggies, I sautéed all the veggies for a few minutes, poured it all in a bowl and topped with the sauce.

Unlike my mother, I also Instagrammed it.

But unlike my mother's, mine was vegetarian. Vegan, in fact.

And also unlike my mother's casseroles, this looked good, So good, that my daughter asked me to make it for her for dinner.