Curried Quinoa with Chickpeas and Apples

This is my latest favorite quinoa dish. It keeps for 4-5 days in the fridge, so I like to make it one evening and then eat it for lunch for a few days. It's good plain, atop a salad and put into collard leaf wraps.

Curried Quinoa Salad with Chickpeas snd Apples

• 1 cup quinoa
• 2 cups water
• 1 Tbsp curry powder
• 1 tsp cumin

Bring all ingredients to a boil and cover, reduce heat and simmer 15-20 minutes. Remove from heat and cool.

When cool, toss with:

• 1 green apple, diced
• 1 can chickpeas, rinsed and drained
• 1/4 c diced cilantro
• 2 carrots, shredded
• 1/4 c diced green onions

Mix up and stir in dressing:

• 3 Tbsp EVOO
• 1 Tbsp Apple Cider Vinegar
• Juice of 1 lime
• 1 tsp lime zest
• salt and pepper to taste

Quinoa Stuffed Peppers

I was also looking for a non-side dish way to use quinoa, and tried this recipe.

It took a little time to prepare the quinoa, but I made it up during naptime/quiet time and also stuffed the peppers. Once stuffed, I put them in the oven with the timer on and came home to a hot dinner.



I only made 2 peppers and will restuff and bake fresh peppers when we have leftovers. I topped mine as directed in the recipe (vegan style) and topped Mark's with real cheese. This was pretty good. The quinoa was actually seasoned just about perfectly. When I make these again, I will probably salt and pepper the peppers as well. The recipe suggests serving them with gucamole and I hope to do that too, but I thought these were great with a side salad.

Gingery Quinoa-Stuffed Acorn Squash

Ok so this is officially my first post on the Monthly Challenge thanks to my friend Kerri for inviting me to join! So I'll start this post off with saying I've never used Quinoa before but have read lots of good things about it so it was a great excuse to try it out. So off I went to Allrecipes.com to see what I could find. I settled on this recipe as my whole family loves acorn squash and frankly all the spices and ingredients sounded good. So here's how it went...

Recipe:

found at allrecipes.com by Jeana Malcolm

http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Gingery-Quinoa-Stuffed-Acorn-Squash/Detail.aspx

1. While my acorn squash were baking I started the dicing and sauteing part..it looks so pretty in the pan I think so I'm pretty excited at this point.

2. Quinoa cooking away...

3. Acorn squash come out of the oven and needs to cool before getting scooped

4. Spices and apples going in now...smells very aromatic and looks really good but I'm losing my excitement for some reason about the meal...not sure if the smells weren't appealing to my pregnant appetite or what...so I was getting anxious about it being our dinner lets put it that way. I need to also add that I'm not a huge ginger fan..I appreciate what it adds to a lot of dishes but something about the smell doesn't do much for me so why I picked this recipe I'm not sure?

5. Well here goes nothing...I'm stuffing all the mix back into the squash skins and topping them with the mozzarella to go back in for the final melting stage...as you can see they are HUGE..and there was stuffing left over even if I hadn't dumped half of one squash do to me scraping it too hard and ripping it in half..grrrr. So basically I didn't even use up all the filling...it makes a ton!

6. Here's the final product..they look fine I think and are definitely plenty to fill you up. Now to try them out.

Our family's review: Matt my husband and I both thought they were ok but something about the sweetness was a bit strong for us. I couldn't pin it down as to whether it was the smell/sweetness of the cinnamon/sugar/nutmeg...or my dreaded ginger flavor. But the dish is very aromatic and something just wasn't thrilling to either of us. Audrey my 2.5 year old....smells EVERYTHING before eating it...gave it a sniff and made a face (maybe she's anti-ginger too..lol). Matt got her to try it and she did eat a bite but then reached for her sippy cup and said "I need to wash it down!" So while Matt and I are trying not to totally lose it..I honestly felt the same way..and was secretly dreaming of a pizza. Then Matt got her to try another bite...and she goes for it then lets it kind of hang out by a string of cheese and says "I need to spit this out."

Now in no way would I ever not reccommend a meal based on a 2 year olds review who's mood on any food changes by the hour...but I had to add those in due to the fact and I myself wasn't shot in the head with the meal. Anyways...I think the concept is a great idea and you could really play around with the flavors and what you stuff back into the squash..in fact you could do this with any squash you might like not just acorn. I don't think the star ingredient Quinoa played any role in our not liking it so it would be good stuffed in..I think the spice mixture was more of the issue for us personally. I would definitely still try using Quinoa again..just not perhaps this recipe.

Quinoa Corn Muffins

I wanted to try something new with quinoa and came across a Quinoa Corn muffin recipe in the Whole Foods free magazine cookbook. It called for quinoa flour, but I just ground up dry quinoa in the Vita Mix, which I am assuming is the same thing.

The muffins weren't so good. The quinoa taste completely overpowered the corn taste. I ate one, but no one else ate more than a bite (and we are a family that loves our corn muffins). I'm not posting the recipe because they aren't worth making again....

Curried Quinoa Recipe

This very random site had this recipe for Curried Quinoa and so I tried it...I'll try anything once. Honestly, I liked and as did my husband. I had run out of frozen peas so I used baby lima beans.

Which picture is better? FLASH?

Or NO FLASH?

I like no flash personally...

Mexican Quinoa Salad

So, the vegans came to dinner...

I invited the people who inspired my vegan conversion for dinner Sunday night. They hosted us a few weeks back, and that in addition to everything else, I really owed them a dinner. It was a little intimidating to do this, but it turns out ok. I made the sweet potato and black bean burritos that have been posted here before. I also made a tomato and avacado salsa. Now, to be honest, if it was just me and Mark, I would call that good. But is it company good? Not sure. I decided that I needed to make some rice. Oh wait, I have this quinoa challenge! I'll make some of that. I did a quick google search and it was hard to find a recipe that did not include ingredients I was already planning on using: tomatoes, black beans, etc. I did find this one recipe which had spinach and corn instead. Score!

I followed the recipe, but made changes to make it eaiser. ;) One, I used red wine vinegar instead of apple cider in the dressing. But that is just cause I'm an idiot. Oops! Instead of sauting the fresh corn and steaming the fresh spinach, I just added both to the hot quinoa and stirred it up. That's how I roll!

The result was not earth shattering, but it was a nice little salad. All the vegans (and Mark) ate it up. I had no leftovers. I could see making it again.

Spanish-Style Quinoa

This was my first time using quinoa and will definitely be looking for more recipes to use use with it.  I was afraid it was going to be like cous cous - not a favorite of mine.  However, it was a bit nutty and more like brown rice.

I used a recipe from allrecipes.com for Spanish-Style Quinoa and served it up with some skillet enchiladas.  Even my picky husband liked it!

•  Spanish Style Quinoa
• 2 tablespoons vegetable oil
• 1 cup uncooked quinoa
• 1 medium onion, finely chopped
• 3 cloves garlic, minced
• 1 small green bell pepper, chopped
• 1 (8 ounce) can tomato sauce
• 2 1/2 cups water
• 1 teaspoon chili powder
• 1/4 teaspoon garlic powder
• 1/4 teaspoon ground cumin

Heat the vegetable oil in a large saucepan over medium-high heat. Stir in the quinoa, onion, garlic, and green pepper. Cook and stir 5 to 10 minutes until the onion is tender, and the quinoa has lightly toasted. Stir in the tomato sauce and water, then season with the chili powder, garlic powder, and cumin. Bring to a boil, then reduce heat to medium-low, cover, and simmer until the quinoa is tender, and the liquid is absorbed, about 30 minutes. Stir the quinoa occasionally as it cooks.

Herbed Quinoa

This recipe from Giada was a good place for me to start:) I enjoyed it and did my girls. C...not so much, but I think it was because they do have a little "garbanzo" flavor to them.

This Herbed Quinoa was a nice fresh side dish with the herbs and lemon...

winning as the kids say

Pizza Quiona Casserole

This week I tried this recipe from Peas and Thank You. This is one of those recipes that I am not sure why I decided to try this one. It is not something like we normally eat. Basically the recipe tells you to make some quinoa, mix it with a bunch of stuff, then bake it. After it is baked, you can use this as a pizza base to put topping on. Here is my base:



And I prepared several things for toppings. For Mark and the boys, shredded cheese and hot dogs. For me, daiya, sauteed mushrooms and peppers. I also served it with broccoli. I guess maybe that is why I decided to try this recipe. The boys love the family style!



And here is James, my little angel, getting more broccoli!



Oh, and Andy getting more hot dog. Um, well, ok.



This is how my quinoa pizza turned out:


Speaking of the quinoa, I am not raw, eat raw, or anything, but I have heard some people talk about things like "sprouting" Is this what you mean, but sprouting?


Cause I cooked and assembled everything during naptime, then baked it right before dinner. I may not have put it in the fridge. Us microbiologist don't usually practice what we preach...

At any rate, this was ok, probably wouldn't make it again. And then I remember why we normally don't do family style:


What a mess!

Quinoa and Black Bean Taco Salad

I've been making this recipe for about 3 years now. It's easy, cheap and very quick. Sometimes we eat it as is, other times I put it over salad for a Taco Salad type meal.

March challenge: Quinoa

This one is actually Jenny's idea. She has been telling me for the last month all the places to find it in the area. I know I have cooked with it once in my last hippie food phase, but it has been a couple of years. So everybody...get cooking!