Are you keen on Quinoa?

Do you use Quinoa? (Pronounced keen-wa or kwi-no-a) according to a book I read on ancient Incan grains.

Being diagnosed gluten-intolerant a few years ago, I've explored a lot of options and found a lot of great new foods that have become mainstays in our pantry, fridge and on the dining table.

Quinoa is one of them. Its a great grain to have on hand and great in salads.

Although I will admit my use of it is (very) limited.

I make just one salad with it, but to be honest that salad is soooo good I don't need to do anything else with it.

You can cook Quinoa just as you would rice using the absorption method. I add one cup of well-washed Quinoa to two cups of water, bring it to the boil, turn it right down to low, cover with a secure lid and check on it after about 12 minutes.

It does that 'crab-hole' thing that rice does when its all cooked and all the water is absorbed.

This is what it looks like cooked BELOW - little glistening pearls of goodness. In fact Quinoa is ridiculously good for you (including being high in protein) and you can read more about it online.

My recipe comes via a (healthy) friend of ours.

Take your Quinoa (I do one cup) and cook it up and allow to cool. Meanwhile I chop sweet potato up into small pieces and cook that in the oven until its lovely and caramelised BELOW.

I then mix the sweet potato into the Quinoa, then add pepper, oil (whatever type you like - I add olive oil, sometimes macadamia oil - depends what's in the pantry), red wine vinegar (I've also used balsamic when I've been out of red wine vinegar and it tasted just as good) to season it.

I then add diced up fetta cheese and finely chopped rocket.

Mix it all together and enjoy. Its great this time of year to have with barbeques or to take to work for lunches. Its also great if you have a lot of people coming over for lunch, a big bowl of this and a big bowl of rice salad will fill them up.

Do you have any great Quinoa recipes you'd like to share?

Cheers,
Sonya