It’s taken awhile…. but I’ve finally jumped on board the quinoa train!
So much so, that in one week I used nearly a whole bag of the stuff! And, while I didn’t really eat it for breakfast, lunch and dinner on one day, I really did eat it for all of the main meals at some stage during the past week! What an amazingly versatile seed. I may just be in love with the stuff!
For those that don’t know, quinoa is a seed that originates from the Peruvian Andes. It is pronounced “keen-wa” and is high in protein, fibre, magnesium and iron, and also a source of calcium and gluten-free!* I’m no expert, but doesn’t that sound like it covers all food groups?!?! (I’m sure you could put it with chocolate, too, if you really wanted…I’m just sure there’s a recipe for it!)
*There is so much written about quinoa on the internet, that I didn’t refer to just one source for this information. Predominantly, I used Wikipedia.
After Christmas/New Years/moving/January, I really felt the need to kick-start my healthy eating again. I had heard so much about quinoa and seen so many pictures and recipes shared on Instagram (thank you IG friends for your inspiration!) and other blogs, that I felt I should try it!
Breakfast using quinoa was actually the last dish that I attempted, but it makes sense to share that first. For the most part, I used ideas I had seen on Instagram and after cooking it a few times in the past week, I had a rough idea what to do with it!
Here’s my version of Quinoa and berries
The ingredients
Serves 2
1 1/2 C reduced fat/high calcium milk
1/2 C white quinoa
1 dessert spoon of honey
1/2 tsp vanilla essence
1/2 C raspberries and strawberries
The method
Rinse the quinoa first and pat the excess water off with a paper towel.
In a saucepan, bring the milk and quinoa to boil, then reduce heat to low and simmer for approximately 30 minutes. Stir the milk and quinoa regularly and use a spoon to skim off the milk skin.
Take the saucepan off of the heat, pour into a bowl and add in the honey and vanilla essence. Refrigerate to chill, at least 30 minutes.
Serve in a bowl, and place the fruit on top. Voila! Breakfast is served 
Quinoa Salad
I may just call this a “salad of the superfoods”
With almonds, cranberries and spinach all in the one bowl, I was sure I could feel my insides getting automatically healthier!!
I may just call this a “salad of the superfoods”
With almonds, cranberries and spinach all in the one bowl, I was sure I could feel my insides getting automatically healthier!!Once again, I used quite a few ideas I’d seen on Instagram and the internet, adding and removing ingredients I liked or didn’t, but I adapted the base of my salad from a “Quinoa summer salad” recipe I found on the Nutrition and Healthy Eating Australia website.
The ingredients
Serves 3-4
3 C water
1 C quinoa
2 tsp vegetable stock powder
110g (3.88oz) can of chickpeas, drained and rinsed
1/2 red onion, chopped finely
1/2 C craisins (dried cranberries)
2 sticks celery, diced
1 tbsp fresh parsley, chopped roughly
1 C mixed baby spinach and rocket leaves
1/4 C slivered almonds and pine nuts
handful of green beans, cut into 1-inch long pieces
1/2 fresh lemon
The method
Bring the water, stock powder and quinoa to the boil, reduce the heat to low and simmer for 15 minutes. Drain the quinoa.
Combine all of the ingredients in a salad bowl, except for the lemon which you can use to squeeze over the top as a simple dressing. I served my salad with a dollop of natural greek yoghurt. This would fairly easily serve 4 people for lunch, or in my case, 3 big and hearty lunches!
And, lastly, we have dinner….Lime chicken drumsticks and quinoa with latin flavours
I based the quinoa portion on this recipe: http://www.eatingwell.com/recipes/quinoa_with_latin_flavors.html
The chicken drumsticks are a basic chicken drumstick that I have been cooking for years.
The ingredients
Serves 2
4 chicken drumsticks
1 lime
Bunch of chives (fresh from my garden!), chopped finely
2 C water
1 1 tsp vegetable stock powder
1/2 C quinoa
1/2 small onion, diced finely
1 small green chilli, chopped finely
1/4 C pepitas (pumpkin seeds), toasted
1/2 C fresh coriander (cilantro), chopped roughly
1 green onion (shallot), sliced finely
Handful of mung beans
Preheat oven to 200 degrees C (392 F). In a baking dish, cover the chicken with the chives and 1/2 freshly squeezed lime. Bake the drumsticks in the oven until cooked, approximately 35-40 minutes.
Meanwhile, cook the quinoa with the same method as the salad (boil quinoa, water, vegetable stock and simmer for 15 minutes). Drain.
Fry the onion and chilli over a medium heat in a frying pan, until the onion is soft, approximately 3-4 minutes. Remove from the heat.
Combine the pepitas, coriander, shallots and mung beans with the onion and chilli.
Add in the quinoa and drizzle with the remaining half of lime juice.
Serve on a plate with the chicken drumsticks.
My overall opinion of quinoa is that, again, it is a highly versatile seed! It is not particularly full of flavour on its own, but it goes so well with both sweet and savoury styles of food. Although, while I liked the flavour of the quinoa with the milk, honey and vanilla, I found the texture a bit odd for breakfast (if that makes sense?!).
I really enjoyed my salad and the quinoa tasted delicious cooked in the vegetable stock.
It is more expensive than I would normally like to spend, but it goes such a long way that is quite good value for money. I will definitely use it again….and I may even search out a recipe with chocolate….purely for experimental purposes, of course!
Now all I have to do is get DS on board…if I serve it with beer maybe that would help
Yum yum. Your insides must be the picture of health after all that quinoa Ali. We love it too. Have never had it for brekkie though. Keen to give it a try. Looks lovely. Made a similar salad last week with amaranth. So yum. Love cranberries in salad. Trying to get as many salads in as we can, before the cold weather hits!
It was good in brekky but I think mainly because of the honey and vanilla! The texture may take a bit to get used so I think that’s why I enjoyed the salad more! Cranberries really make a salad!
I have eaten quinoa on a couple of occasions. It goes really well with salads. Love your food pics.
Michael, you are making me hungry. Dinner time, meatless Wednesday. Recipes are always a keeper. Thanks.
You’ve really shown the versatility of quinoa with these recipes Ali! Your photos are beautiful — looks like you are having fun with your new camera.
Thanks Barb! I actually really enjoyed the quinoa….and funnily enough, I haven’t had any this week and I think I felt better last week! Psychological maybe! But, I’ll definitely be trying to use it more regularly
It was just a new lens I got, but I did get my camera cleaned and serviced, so yes, I am having a lot of fun with the “new” camera, thank you
I’m a huge fan of quinoa too! I haven’t tried it for breakfast yet…thank you for recipes!
You’re welcome
You’ll have to let me know if you try it in breakfast! Thanks for visiting my blog 
That’s awesome! I love the idea of incorporating it into the dessert with berries. Definitely one for the health-kick list.
Thanks for visiting my blog
The flavours of the breakfast were very tasty…and very healthy!
I too have just started to get into quinoa! Thanks for the inspirational recipes. i now have more ideas of what to do with it
You’re welcome. Thanks for your comment. I can’t believe how many different recipes it can be used in!
If these quinoa recipes are for breakfast, lunch and dinner, this is perfect
Cheers
Choc Chip Uru
It is kind of perfect, isn’t it! So versatile!
You are inspiring. Everything looks delicious! I need to prepare more with quinoa. I love the breakfast and drumsticks. However, that salad is over the top incredible Ali! Yum!!
I hope you don’t mind if I reblog your link on my reblog page?
Thankyou for your lovely comments
I am so honoured x The salad is great (as I say tucking into another for lunch right now!) Very healthy but tasty too! xx
Quinoa does have a tendency to grab you and make you fall in love! I’m glad you’ve been enjoying it, and these recipes / ideas all sound great
Thanks for your comment and for popping by
It’s great stuff!
I love quinoa I have been eating it for years now, it has gone up hugely in price though. I like to make fried rice with it, that is how I first had it in Peru six years ago. Also adding it to soup is really nice.
The fried rice sounds really lovely, I’ll have to give that a try…and remember to put it in soups during “soup” season…thanks for the ideas!
I jumped on the quinoa bandwagon last year, finally. All of your recipes look great but I’m particularly drawn to the salad…yum!
The salad was my favourite of all of them, which is shown by the fact I’ve made it again since!
I still haven’t jumped on the bandwagon yet
I’ve seen a lot of my friend jump on and they seem to love it ~ But i somehow haven’t hehe but all your quinoa dishes look great! So it’s getting me think, maybe it’s time I got some and tried making it at home too!!
You should try it…at least once! It is not the tastiest on it’s own but cooked in a bit of stock and it’s a great addition to a salad or as a replacement to rice.
This is like my perfect menu! I’ve yet to try sweet quinoa, but you’ve made it look so tasty! I recently jumped on the bandwagon myself and I’m finding it pretty tasty stuff to try with other..stuff. I’d come up with a better way to describe it if I wasn’t so tired! That photo of the chickpeas had my mouth watering!
I think it’s great that you can have the 3 main meals with the same core ingredient! The breakfast was good, but not my favourite of the 3. The salad was just too good!
I love quinoa (although for some reason I always have to remind myself how to pronounce it!). Although I’m kinda boring in the way I use it – typically like you did with the chicken. I’ve yet to make a salad with it, and definitely haven’t combined it with berries and a bit of sweet. Love that, BTW. Really good stuff – thanks.
Thanks John
I found that I really enjoyed it in the salad, was a very filling dish with all of the vegetables and nuts!
I am also a big fan of quinoa but seldom make it at home. I love to use quinoa flakes for breakfast instead of cereal & to use it to make a porridge. I love your tasty recipes here a lot!
MMMM! I must experiment further with the quinoa possibilites!
We eat quinoa quite a lot and I too love its versatility. I’ve got quite a few quinoa recipes collected already on my blog, hope you can check them out http://kitcheninspirations.wordpress.com/category/recipes/quinoa-recipes/
Thanks for the link to the quinoa recipes
I’m always after new ways to cook quinoa, so I’ve bookmarked your link for reference!
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