Cucumber Caprese Quinoa Shells

I would be lying if I said I haven't been eyeballing caprese recipes lately. To be honest, I have never tried a caprese salad. But I don't understand why... I love all of the basic ingredients!

Lucky for me, my coworker brought me a big bag of homegrown basil today. I searched through the last few recipes I starred, compared to what was in my kitchen and came up with this: a random, combination of these two recipes.

• Cucumber Avocado Caprese Salad
• Orzo Caprese Salad

I loved the idea of adding cucumbers to the caprese salad (since cucumber + tomato = legen... wait for it... dary! legendary!) and I liked the idea of the salad mixed with the orzo (or more specifically, any sort of grain... I was thinking quinoa, cous cous, brown rice... something along those lines to stretch the flavor and make it more filling). So I mixed and matched and made some changes based on what I had on hand, but I really want to try the originals someday!!

Cucumber Caprese Quinoa Pasta

Ingredients (my version):

• 1.5 cups uncooked quinoa pasta shells
• 3 cucumbers 
• 10.5 oz cherry tomatoes
• 1/2 cup fresh basil (firmly packed)
• 1 cup mozarella (the little balls)
• 1 teaspoon olive oil
• 2 tablespoons balsamic vinegar
• garlic, salt, and pepper to taste

Directions
1. Cook the pasta according to directions. Rinse with cold water and mix with a small amount of olive oil to prevent from sticking. Set aside.
2. Follow the directions from this site (excluding avocados because sadly I didn't have them on hand).
3. Eat. A lot.

Yum!

Disclaimer: I am not attempting to call this a recipe, or take any credit for it. I just wanted to share with you the goodness that was my dinner :)