Quinoa: Complete Protein, Meat Free and Gluten Free

On the recommendation of my dear friend Mary, we recently bought this at Costco:

Mary has made a bunch of delicious meatless meals and sides with this quinoa for our Friday Rosary Night Dinners. Everything she has made has been so good! I will be making this dish for Rosary Night tonight.  You can find the recipe here.

Quinoa and Black Beans

Pat's Rating:
Tee's Rating: 4.5/5 stars. I really like the flavor, and because of the cilantro and the corn it is not heavy. It is also not overly time-consuming to make. I definitely want to make this more often!

Ingredients:

1 teaspoon vegetable oil

     

1 onion, chopped                                                                        

3 cloves garlic, peeled and chopped

3/4 cup uncooked quinoa                                                    

1 1/2 cups vegetable broth                                                    

1 teaspoon ground cumin                                                    

1/4 teaspoon cayenne pepper                                                    

salt and pepper to taste                                                    

1 cup frozen corn kernels                                                    

2 (15 ounce) cans black beans, rinsed and drained                                                    

1/2 cup chopped fresh cilantro

 

1. Heat the oil in a saucepan over medium heat, sauté the onion and garlic. I used extra-virgin olive oil instead, it tasted delicious and one really can't taste the olive oil at all in the final product. I also waited to add the garlic until the onion was done.

 

 

 

2. Add the quinoa and vegetable broth, as well as the spices. I ended up adding about 2 or 3 teaspoons of cumin, I don't have cayenne pepper so I just skipped it. Bring to boil and then cover and simmer for 20 minutes

 

 

3. Stir the frozen corn into the pan, simmer for about 5 minutes until heated through. Haha this is certainly not the most appetizing picture!! Flash would have been better.

 



 

6. Stir in black beans and cilantro.

 

 

I opted to add the cilantro separately to taste.

 

 

And then add some sour cream to top off the dish:

 

 

All in all: easy, healthy, and delicious! This can be a side any day or a main dish on Friday. I bet it will also taste delicious with chicken and/or fresh tomatoes.

Recipe Review

Pat is healing up well post surgery, but he is still having a hard time chewing anything. So I decided to make some soup, and the most delicious sounding thing I could think of was loaded baked potato soup. Yum!

Loaded Potato Soup a la Betty Crocker, Pioneer Woman Style

Pat's rating: 4/5 Stars
Tee's rating: 4/5 stars. Total comfort food, full of deliciousness. Did take some time with all the peeling and chopping. May be able to come up with some shortcuts (i.e. use pre-baked potatoes, cream of mushroom canned soup perhaps. . .) This is a good soup, but not a super quick, throw together type of recipe.

Then I got inspired to take step by step pictures, like the Pioneer Woman. Unfortunately I thought of it too late to take a picture of the 'Cast of characters'. However, I will list the ingredients:

So ingredients:

1 package (12 oz) bacon                        

1 1/2  cups chopped onion                        

6  cups Progresso® chicken broth                        

2 lb baking potatoes, peeled, cubed                        

2/3 cup butter                        

3/4 cup all-purpose flour                        

4 cups milk                        

1 teaspoon salt                        

1 teaspoon freshly ground pepper                        

1 cup diced cooked ham                        

1 container (8 oz) sour cream                        

2 1/2 cups shredded sharp Cheddar cheese (10 oz)                        

 3/4 cup sliced green onions    

1. Cook the bacon in a skillet until it is crispy. Mmmmmm bacon bacon bacon. If only I could somehow attach the smell of this cooking deliciousness! Maybe one day . . . then, Drain and crumble bacon.

                    

2. Meanwhile, chop the onion. Once the bacon is complete, reserve a couple tablespoons bacon grease and cook the onions in the same skillet with the bacon grease until almost tender. Oh delicious bacon grease!!

3. In a Dutch oven, mix the broth, chopped potatoes and onion. Bring to boiling and then lower heat and allow to simmer for 10 minutes.

4. Meanwhile, in the same skillet (gotta love using the same skillet yet again, I love it every single time) Melt the butter.

And add the flour slowly while whisking continuously . . .

5. And then gradually stir in 2 cups of milk and stir until smooth

6. Pour Milk Mixture into potato mixture. Add the remaining two cups of milk, salt and pepper. And then cook over medium heat until it is deliciously thickened and rather bubbly. Mmmmm.

 

7. Stir in the ham, half the bacon, sour cream (mmmmm), 2 cups of cheese, and the green onions (I did not add any green onions because I'm going to test out the freezing potential for this soup!). Yum! Look at that mound of deliciousness!

8. Stir until cheese has melted. Add bacon, cheese, green onions and sour cream to each serving to taste . . .

Unfortunately this final picture was taken after sunset and the lighting is not optimal! I will learn with practice :) It is very filling, as you could probably guess!