What is quinoa? Up until last week I had no idea. Our family is on a grain adventure and one of the grains we tried this week was none other than red quinoa. This grain is a power packed amino acid. It has a large amount of magnesium and riboflavin. It apparently was the “gold of the Incas” giving warriors more stamina. It gave us a good laugh as we all looked at it with concern and considered ordering pizza. I am proud of us, however, we went through with cooking quinoa and the result~ we absolutely loved it!
Please, trust me, this is a grain to bring into your kitchen.
What you will need for Quinoa and Black Beans:
1 teaspoon olive 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
1 can black beans, rinsed and drained
1/2 cup chopped fresh cilantro
What to do:
Step one~
Chop your onion and place it into some olive oil in a pan. Add a bit of garlic.
Step two~
Add 3/4 cup of the quinoia. Admire it as you toss it in! Those tiny grains are going to do good things!
Step three~ Add 1 1/2 cups of vegetable stock/broth.
Step four~ Add your cumin and cayenne pepper. I love the smell of cumin! It makes me happy. LET THE QUINOA cook for TWENTY MINUTES. Those little grains will actually pop open a bit. Cute little guys….
Step five~
Drain and rinse your black beans. Set aside one cup of corn. Chop your cilantro. Add them to the quinoia and stir.
Step six~
Be proud of yourself for cooking something new!
We ate the Quinoa with a little bit of salsa. We also filled a whole wheat tortilla with avocado. This was a vegetarian meal, super healthy and oh oh oh so good!
I got this recipe off of www.allrecipes.com. I modified it by only adding in one can of black beans. The original recipe called for two. We did not find the necessary at all.
mer@lifeat7000feet says
I discovered your blog just now! Definitely will be back!
Question for you: Can you freeze cilantro? I ask because yours looks frozen. My refrigerator has a tendency to freeze things like lettuce and cilantro and I sometimes end up having to throw them out b/c they’re frozen. That pic inspires me to hold on to them a little longer!
Ethiopianmomma says
You can freeze cilantro, however it does lose that amazing taste. It keeps enough taste to use in recipes such as this. I would not use frozen cilantro in something like pico de gallo though. I grow my own herbs and freeze them at the very end of the season. Most do really well, especially for things like winter soups. But, if you really need that cilantro to pack a lot of taste power then buy it fresh. If you just need it a little bit (like in this recipe) it is fine to use frozen!