Quinoa - Black Bean Salad

An easy summer salad great to have made up for quick meals or get together! Goes great over a bed of lettuce, eat with tortilla chips, in a lettuce wrap with some avocado, you name it!

Sautéed Asparagus & Artichokes With Red Quinoa

Quinoa is so simple, it really can be used in place of rice or even pasta. It's great with stir-fried or sautéed veggies. It's great so many ways really. I have been eating a lot of it lately and my appreciation for how versatile it is has grown. So today, I kept thinking about the package of frozen baby asparagus I had in the freezer and how I wanted to prepare it. Normally I just steam or roast it with a drizzle of olive oil, which is delicious but I wanted to do something different his time. I also had a package of fresh mushrooms that needed to be used up and the two together just sounded good.


Anyway, for those of you who know it is healthy and want to eat it more, but are unsure of what to do with it, here is another recipe for you!

Quinoa:
1 cup red quinoa
2 cups water
1 tsp salt
1 tbsp olive oil

Asparagus Sauté:
2 tbsp sesame oil
2 tbsp tamari or other gluten free soy sauce
3-4 garlic cloves minced
1 onion sliced
1 small pkg button mushrooms
1 pkg fresh or frozen asparagus
1 can artichoke hearts
2-3 sprigs of fresh basil

Directions:
Cook 1 cup of quinoa in two cups of water. Add the salt and simmer until quinoa is soft, about 20 minutes. Add the olive oil when all the water has cooked out. Sauté the garlic and onions in the sesame oil until they soften, add the mushrooms and continue to sauté until the mushrooms are soft. Add in the asparagus and tamari and cover to steam for about 5 minutes. Rinse and drain the artichokes. Remove cover and add artichokes and sauté until artichokes are warm. Tear up the basil leaves and sprinkle on top. Serves 2-4 people.

Avocado Toast

This is one of my very favorite meals. It is really simple, not really a recipe, more of an assembly. I just had to post this because I absolutely love my toast this way. I try not to eat a lot of bread, but when I do, it's either homemade gluten free or from my favorite local bakery that makes gluten free breads. This particular bread bread is white in color, but it is actually made from whole grain millet flour, brown rice flour and water. That's it! I really want to know their secrets so I can bake my own! It is not soft like white bread, but it makes amazing crunchy toast. I usually keep a loaf in the freezer since I don't eat it often. It's perfect for grabbing a piece or two to toast when I want it.

Sweet Sautéed Beets With Greens

This is a dish I have been craving since the first time I made it. Sweet and savory, so delicious a new favorite! I grew up eating pickled beets that my grandmother made fresh from her garden. I could have eaten the whole jar if she wasn't looking. I have always been a fan of beets. But after I grew up I rarely ate them. I guess I never really knew how to prepare them or what to do with them until recently. I decided one day to try this out and I am so glad for a successful experiment!

Also, I recently bought an iron skillet that I found at a flea market for ten dollars! It was unused and "unseasoned". I seasoned it initially by coating it in oil and baking it in my oven upside down, with a sheet of tin foil on the rack below it, for about an hour at 400 degrees. This gave it the nice black coating. Since I have been using it, it has gotten blacker and more non-stick. I love it now that it is easier to cook in! I will be using this instead of my old cheapy non-stick pans with all of the unknown toxins leaching slowly into my foods. Iron is good for you, so a little bit of iron leached into your food can only be a good thing. As the guy at the flea market said "the original iron supplement"!

Sautéed Beets
2 tbsp coconut oil
1 medium onion sliced
2 garlic cloves minced
2 tbsp water
1 bunch of beets with the greens
2 tbsp maple syrup or other sweetner
sea salt to taste

Directions:
Cut the greens off the beets at the base and rinse very well. Scrub the beets with a vegetable brush or peel with a vegetable peeler. Cut off the roots and the stems then slice. Depending on the size of the greens, leave whole or chop a bit if they are large.

In a skillet, saute the onions and garlic in coconut oil until they start to caramelize or brown, stirring frequently. Add in the beets and saute for a couple minutes stirring frequently. Then add the water, cover with the lid and let them steam for about 5-6 minutes. Stir again and add in the beet greens on top and cover and let it continue to steam for about another 5 minutes. Once the beets are soft and the greens wilted, add in the maple syrup, sprinkle with some sea salt and stir, saute for about 2 more minutes. I listed this as a side, but I eat this as an entree I love it so much! Warning this dish is highly addictive if you like beets!

Quinoa With Red Lentils & Basil

This is a fairly simple and tasty recipe for quinoa. If you like lentils, you will love this. The combinations of garlic, onion, lentils and basil is YUM. I highly recommend the fresh basil for this dish. If you are not a fan of basil - you are crazy... kidding! Anyway, you could try substituting with fresh cilantro, another of my favorite herbs.

Roasted Vegetable Herbed Gravy

From Vegetarian Times Magazine:
2 russet potatoes
12 button mushrooms
3 carrots
3 celery stalks
2 small onions
4-5 cloves of garlic, crushed
1 tbsp olive oil
1/4 dry red wine
1 tbsp tomato paste
4 sprigs fresh parsley
1 tsp of thyme (or 4 sprigs of  fresh)
1/2 tsp rosemary (or 2 sprigs of  fresh)
1/2 tsp majoram (or 2 sprigs of fresh)
1/2 tsp sage (or 2 sprigs of fresh)
2 bay leaves
12 peppercorns

Preheat oven to 425 degrees. Quarter 1 russet potato, and place in large dutch oven with mushrooms, carrots, celery, onions and garlic. Toss with olive oil. Roast 30 minutes, stirring every 10 minutes or until vegetables are deep brown on edges.

Transfer Dutch oven to stove top and stir in wine, tomato paste and 8 cups of water. Add fresh herb sprigs, bay leaves and peppercorns. Bring to a boil, simmer for 30 minutes. Let stand 10 minutes. 

Strain liquid, (you should have 5 cups) and discard solids. Peel remaining potato, and cut into small cubes. Return broth to pot with potato and season with salt and pepper if desired. Simmer uncovered for 30 minutes, or until liquid is reduced to 2.5 cups. Blend liquid with potato in blender or using an immersion blender. Strain gravy through a sieve or fine-meshed strainer.

What a yummy vegetable, no-guilt gravy. I made a version of this gravy for Thanksgiving, it was delish, my mom loved it and she's not vegetarian! As a vegetarian I do not have to skip on gravy any more... love it!! Now, for my version I saved all the mushrooms and kept them whole in the gravy... I love mushrooms I was not gonna let those babies go to waste! I also took part of the strained veggies and put them in the food processor and pureed them and added them back to thicken the gravy more. I used ground peppercorns instead of whole. I did not strain my gravy either. I wanted mine thick! I also used mostly dried herbs, I did not have majoram, red wine or tomato paste on hand. It was really tasty without these ingredients. Another great thing about this gravy... it NEVER clumps, you can make it ahead, refrigerate it, reheat it, and no lumps. Unfortunately, I have no picture for this recipe!