Wednesday, May 30, 2012

Quinoa and Black Bean Salad

I got the original recipe off of The Girl Who Ate Everything and made a some changes.  When Calvin came into the kitchen and asked what was for dinner and I told him Quinoa he asked me what that was.  I said it's seeds that are kind of like rice.  He laughed and told Anna Elise that was I making up words.  When he realized I was serious he got VERY upset and informed me that seeds were not dinner!  I could sense an uprising as the kids all ran for the kitchen.  So I told them it was a salad that we were going to eat as salsa with tortilla chips.  Adding a few tortilla chips to the dinner seemed to make it ok!  Everyone ate it and most of them even liked it!  I thought it was delicious - but then I'd eat almost anything with avacados in it!  This fed my family of 7 (although my kids are young so it's probably more like a family of 5) as a main dish and we had some left over.  The quinoa is very filling.  I loved it!


  • 1 teaspoon vegetable oil
  • 1 onion, chopped
  • 1 1/2 teaspoons minced garlic
  • 1 cup uncooked quinoa
  • 2 cups vegetable broth
  • 1/4 teaspoon cayenne pepper
  • 1 Tablespoon lime juice
  • 1 1/2 cups frozen corn
  • 2 (15 ounce) cans of black beans, drained and rinsed 
  • 1/2 cup fresh cilantro, chopped
  • 2 ripe avocado, diced
  • 2 small fresh tomatoes, diced
  • salt and pepper to taste

Directions

  1. Rinse the quinoa in a strainer. Sometimes it can have a bitter taste on the outside so rinsing gets rid of this.
  2. Heat the oil in a saucepan over medium heat. Stir in the onion and garlic, and cook for a couple of minutes or until onion is soft.
  3. Add the quinoa and vegetable broth to the pan. Add the cayenne pepper, salt, and pepper. Bring mixture to a boil and then cover, reduce heat, and simmer for 20 minutes.
  4. Stir in lime juice and frozen corn into the pan and simmer for 5 minutes or until corn is heated through.
  5. Finally, mix in the black beans, cilantro, avacado and tomotoes.

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