Since going gluten-free, I have heard a lot of great things about Quinoa. Considered, “the mother grain” by the Incas, Quinoa has all the essential amino acids, unlike wheat which has to be paired with a legume to be a complete protein. However, I have never cooked it until tonight! Now, I love Quinoa too! My family will be eating a lot of this “mother grain” in the future because it is absolutely delicious as well as nutritious. I did not know how quinoa is traditionally served or what pairs well with quinoa, but I decided to give it a try.
I bought a box of Quinoa, so the preparation was rather simple. I put 1 cup of Quinoa, 1/4 cup of onion, and 2 cups of water in a saucepan and waited for it to boil. Once it started to boil, I covered the pan, turned the heat to low and let it cook for 10-15 minutes. When all the water absorbs and the grain is somewhat translucent your quinoa is done. While the quinoa was cooking, I sauteed some mushrooms. When the mushrooms were nearly done, I added 10 oz. of thawed frozen spinach and 1 chopped red jalapeño. When the quinoa was done, I mixed it with the mushroom mixture and added 1-2 Tablespoons of chopped cilantro. You can serve your quinoa just like this. It is delicious.
OR
You can make enchiladas and use the quinoa mixture as your filling.
For the enchiladas you will need:
6 corn tortillas
Quinoa mixture
8 oz. Monterrey Jack, shredded
GF enchilada sauce of choice- [I made a quick sauce using 1 can of Muir Glen fire roasted tomatoes, 1 can of Muir Glen tomato sauce, 1 diced red jalapeno, 1/2 T of chile powder, and 1 teaspoon of cumin. I let it simmer for 15-20 minutes while I made the rest of the meal. WARNING: This sauce is hot! I would recommend changing the proportions or making a different sauce if you can't handle a little bit of heat!]
Directions:
Put 1/2 the enchilada sauce in the bottom of 2 or 2.5 quart casserole dish. Fill 6 corn tortillas with the quinoa mixture (you may wish to add a little of the MJ cheese to the filling) and lay them face down. Cover with the remaining enchilada sauce and top with MJ cheese if desired. Bake for 15-20 minutes.
Serves about 4.
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Posted on September 11th, 2007 by Natalie
Filed under: Vegetarian Recipes
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Looking good! Quinoa was the surprise grain for me too. I use it instead of couscous in things. My children loved couscous, and although they can still eat gluten, I don’t make couscous because it’s so hard with the cross-contamination; those grains are SO small!
Hi - I just found your site today - looks like a treasure trove of ideas : ) I have been curious about trying quinoa and this looks like the perfect place to start - Thanks!
Quinoa really is great stuff. We also use it instead of couscous and the quinoa flake is a nice sub for oats in baked items. I’ll have to try your recipe, sounds zippy!
Katherine
SM- You are right about that! You will have to ban couscous to your non-gf kitchen. =)
Childlife- Thank you for the compliment. I ventured over to your site too. I am definitely going to try that graham cracker recipe.
Katherine-I have not been able to source quinoa flakes locally. I am going to ask Whole Foods to start carrying it, but until then I am stuck ordering it online!
[...] Quinoa Enchiladas (favorite way to eat enchiladas vegetarian [...]
hi natalie!
this looks amazing!
and in the picture -
looks like there is
chicken added?
i know this may sound
like a ridiculous question
but i am - for some reason -
completely clueless
when it comes to cooking chicken.
i think its because there
are SO MANY WAYS!!!
how would/did YOU
cook the chicken for this
recipe?
CLUE
LESS!!!
: )
thank you!!!!!
cz- those are mushrooms I swear! lol If I were to add chicken to this recipe I would use leftover shredded roasted chicken. You could also heat some oil on med. high heat and cook the chicken that way.
Or poaching the chicken would work! Basically you would boil the chicken until it was no longer pink and you could add herbs for flavor if you wanted to!
those are SOME MUSHROOMS!!!
poaching! interesting!
you just boil, eh?
GENIUS!!
any particular herbs or spices?
or maybe the enchilada sauce
would cover that (no pun.)
thanks!
[...] to a lot of people (including me!) I was not sure how to integrate it into my cooking. I have made enchiladas with quinoa and even cookies with quinoa flakes. For this recipe, I cooked my red quinoa in my rice [...]