Quinoa Rocks

And I wish I could show you a picture, but my camera's batteries died as I was trying to take pictures of tonight's dinner. I found a recipe on The Vegan Club blog when there was a quinoa recipe contest. The woman who submitted the recipe has a blog of her own, Vegetarian Family. You can link to the recipe here. Now, I didn't have the fresh parsley the recipe called for, so I used a little dried and cut up a couple of scallions for color. I also used flaxseed oil instead of olive oil (since you mix it in after everything is cooked). And I got creative and used half original quinoa and half red quinoa to make the dish even prettier. I'm especially happy because I got to use the rest of a container of grape tomatoes that I had lying around my veggie drawer.

Quinoa, a South American grain, is an absolute superfood, with a full complement of amino acids and (who knew?) Omega-3 fatty acids. You want to rinse quinoa before you cook it to remove the bitter saponin coating, and it's also a good idea to toast it in the cooking pot before adding water to bring out the flavor.

I also tried to adapt a recipe to make rosemary tofu, but the amount of liquid was too small and boiled off as soon as I got it in the pan. Oh, well. I had mushrooms to coat my tofu, and I can figure out another sauce to add some flavor to what I have cooked. But I used up a bag of mushrooms that were lying around the veggie drawer, and I'm happy about that, too.

I have to do some more grocery shopping soon. There are lot of recipes I want to try, so I need to make a list, check it twice (ha!), and get cooking again.