Spanish-Style Quinoa

My brother-in-law was coming over to hang out this evening and I was planning on making some grilled chicken and needed a side dish to go with it.  I remembered I had some Quinoa (pronounced keen-wah) on hand because I've been wanting to try it for a long time. I didn't have the guts to eat it plain for the first time, that would just be weird :P , so I Googled me up some recipes! 

There are many great sounding recipes for Quinoa out there, but I needed one that I could make with what I had on hand.  I stumbled upon a recipe on Allrecipes.com for Spanish-Style Quinoa, and I had all of the ingredients except green bell peppers, which works for me since neither my wife, brother-in-law, or me are too crazy about 'em, and it's simple.


Spanish-Style Quinoa

• 2 tablespoons vegetable oil
• 1 cup uncooked quinoa
• 1 medium onion, finely chopped
• 3 cloves garlic, minced
• 1 small green bell pepper, chopped
• 1 (8 ounce) can tomato sauce
• 2 1/2 cups water
• 1 teaspoon chili powder
• 1/4 teaspoon garlic powder
• 1/4 teaspoon ground cumin

Heat the vegetable oil in a large saucepan over medium-high heat. Stir in the quinoa, onion, garlic, and green pepper. Cook and stir 5 to 10 minutes until the onion is tender, and the quinoa has lightly toasted. 

Stir in the tomato sauce and water, then season with the chili powder, garlic powder, and cumin. Bring to a boil, then reduce heat to medium-low, cover, and simmer until the quinoa is tender, and the liquid is absorbed, about 30 minutes. Stir the quinoa occasionally as it cooks. 

It turned out really good!  It reminded me of the rice you get when you go to some of these Mexican restaurants, just without all of the vegetables in it.  And the texture of the quinoa itself was very much like rice, to me anyways.  I might try and play around with this recipe a bit next time, but it's definitely a keeper!  And the quinoa itself is a keeper as well!  I look forward to trying out some more recipes soon!