Quinoa For Dummies

I had a plethora of titles for this post. Some of which included:

• Shit Dr. Oz Says
• Shit Dr. Oz Says to Eat
• It's Oprah's Fault He's on TV in the First Place
• Black Folks Eat Quinoa AND other Healthy Stuff Too

As not to offend anyone, I stuck with Quinoa for Dummies.

Dr. Oz introduced me to quinoa. Not personally, but via his tv show. He's also the reason why The Boy asks for these. The first time I ever tasted quinoa was earlier this year when my friend Chris gave me a bite of hers. She'd mixed together mushrooms, onions, other vegetables and pasta sauce. Meatless. Really good!

I liked it so much that she gave me a whole bag. No recipes, just told me to follow the cooking instructions on the back. She did say I could use it in place of pasta and rice.

My first attempt at making something turned out good. I pretty much followed Chris's lead and did an all veggie mixture with pasta sauce. The Boy and The Girl loved it!

This time around I experimented a bit more. I initially set out looking for a recipe calling for SilkPure Almond Almondmilk Vanilla. Being the experimenter I am, I thought it would taste good mixed with tomato sauce. Like using it in place of heavy cream.

I googled, found a pasta recipe using almondmilk and sun dried tomatoes, and created this

The quinoa is the white puffy stuff on top.

I took the next two photos using the food setting on my camera.

Is there a big difference in how it looks?

The Girl wanted to know what it was called. I told her I made it up.

She said we should call it

Quinoa Asparagus Trio with Tomato Almondmilk Sauce

Care to know what's in it?!

I made sure to write down what I was throwing in the pan as I went along. And in case you didn't know, measuring stuff when I cook is unheard of. 

Except the sauce. I made sure to get those measurements right for you. And measuring the quinoa for the first time can be tricky. This stuff multiplies like rabbits.

I only cooked a small amount because I didn't know what it was going to taste like. It was enough for me and The Girl to have seconds of the portion size pictured. 

The Boy couldn't have any...tree nut allergy. Bless his heart. 

What You Need: 

1/2 cup Almondmilk

1 6oz can tomato paste

1 1/2 cans of water (using the tomato paste can)

1 bundle of asparagus

As much red onion as you like (I like alot)

1 pkg of chicken sausage

garlic powder

dried basil

dried parsley

salt & pepper

1 tblspoon of butter (you can't possibly have sauce without it)

extra virgin olive oil

What You Do:

• Combine tomato paste, almondmilk, and water. I didn't add all the almondmilk at one time. I put in 1/4 cup, tasted it, decided I wanted more, and added another 1/4. That equals half, huh?! Now you can add your garlic powder, basil, parsley, butter, and salt & pepper. Stir all this up and simmer over low heat.

While the sauce is doing its thing, put your quinoa on. It only takes 15 minutes to cook.

Get your trio stuff together. It'll be ready around the same time your quinoa is done.

• Put the olive oil in the pan and throw the onions in to let them start to soften. Or would this be considered carmalizing?! I'll stick to what I know. Sautee the onions and add the asparagus. The chicken sausage I used was fully cooked so I added it when I had my asparagus almost as tender as I wanted it - just so the sausage could heat up and soak up all the flavor from the veggies. 

Now listen. You can make your trio out of whatever you want. You can even turn it into a quadruple. I was really wishing I had some mushrooms. You can add chicken breast, or thin sliced beef or pork. 

There's absolutely nothing wrong with omitting meat altogether.

Are you a quinoa virgin? What would you add to make this your own unique dish?