Spotlight on Quinoa

I love quinoa. Before becoming vegan, I'd never used it. I'd tried some quinoa pasta (not a big hit, sadly) but never thought about using the grain or knew much about it.

These days I'll quickly cook up a batch over rice any day of the week. It's full of protein, cooks up in 15 min, and tastes great. What's not to love about that?

In cleaning out the freezer recently, I found two half blocks of tofu, one extra firm, one firm silken. I thawed them out, squeezed out as much water as I could, and wondered what the heck to do with the soy mess I was facing.

Remembering I had some leftover quinoa in the 'fridge (about a 1/2 cup), I had an idea. Quinoa patties were born. I don't have a formal recipe yet and am excited to work on it. For my first attempt I just mixed in about 2-3 T soy sauce, some nutritional yeast, garlic powder, onion powder, sea salt, black pepper, about 1/4c. rolled oats, and some oregano and thyme (my go-to combo when I'm just checking for texture and not ready to tinker with flavor, it seems). I formed these into patties and began to sautee in grapeseed oil but found that wasn't gonna work.

So in the 350 oven they went for about 25-30 min, flipping half way thru.Oh yeah, these are wonderful. I think they'd be great with a curried flare next time, possilby with a cucumber/soy yogurt sauce. For now, I just ate 'em plain or dipped in a little agave mustard and loved every last bite of them.

When next I make them I think I'll try a couple variations and be sure to jot down my notes and share the recipe(s).