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Ask TracyFood: About quinoa 5 April 2007 2:48 pm

Posted by Tracy in : advice,cooking,eating,eugene,friends,recipes,soup,sundance,vegan,vegetarian , trackback

The stupendously awesome Abi writes:

I’m celebrating Passover this week and I was wondering if you had any quinoa recipes to recommend, as I’m trying to come up with some good ones to go with a couple of other dishes. Quinoa itself is Kosher for Passover, but I follow the tradition where corn and legumes are not. There are two main dishes I want the quinoa to go with. The first is a grouper dish in a tomato based Moroccan sauce involving garlic, cumin, coriander, and paprika. The second is a sweet tzimmes (I make a few adjustments when I cook it, but the recipe I go off of is here) – this is probably the Jewish equivalent of sweet potatoes with marshmallows. Do you have any quinoa recipes you’d recommend that would complement those dishes well, and would be Kosher for Passover?

* * * * *

Dear Abi,

(Insert advice-columnist joke here, I guess.)

Despite my colossal hippitude (okay, so that’s not even a word) I don’t have a lot of quinoa recipes, let alone a favorite. Despite having literally years of experience cooking quinoa for sale to the hippies of Eugene (it’s on the menu at Morning Glory and a hot bar fixture at Sundance), I haven’t really even acquired a taste for the stuff; to me it’s just another grain, and I’m not bored with the others in my repertoire yet. However, your letter inspired me to pick up some quinoa from the bulk bins at Sundance, where they were also selling black quinoa — very exciting, and of course I could not resist getting some of that as well. Also I may be obsessing about this experiment a little harder than usual, because a night or two ago I actually dreamed I made puffed quinoa. No kidding. Anyway, I thought Quinoa with Dried Apricots and Pistachios might be a good place to start this round of quinoa adventures — and not just because it’s a recipe by Deborah Madison, who knows a thing or two about natural foods cooking, oh yes. What’s particularly clever about her approach to quinoa for breakfast is that the spices conceals the somewhat foreign taste of the grain — I know I’m always a little surprised by quinoa, like “Oh hey, this isn’t couscous” or whatever.

But speaking of couscous, that’s exactly what I wanted upon reading your seder menu, and from there and Deborah Madison’s recipe it was only a short step to ras el hanout, a traditional North African spice mix not unlike the seasonings on your grouper dish. So here’s what I got:

All you do is cook the quinoa with the spices until it’s done, 15-20 minutes, and you’re all set; stir the currants in towards the end, when almost all the water is absorbed. I had something very like this for lunch today, topped with a crumble of Pastures of Eden sheep’s milk feta cheese, and it was delicious (slivered almonds would have been good as well, but I was too hungry to chop nuts). It made me want green tea with mint and a lot of sugar, which is usually a pretty good indicator of North African/Middle Eastern flavors.

Random thoughts I couldn’t figure out how to include in the rest of this letter: Is this recipe still kosher for Passover if I started it when I had leavened bread either rising and/or baking in my kitchen? (Somewhere, my distant Jewish ancestors all say “oy.”) How entirely awesome is The Post-Punk Kitchen’s Passover episode? (Sample quote: “Why was the shikseh talking about testicles the whole time?”) Also, is this as good a place as any to link Isa Chandra’s other vegan Passover recipes, guest blogged on Heeb ‘n Vegan? You bet it is! And now I totally want to make TPPK’s matzoh ball soup or something very much like it (unfortunately the silken tofu makes it and many of Isa’s other recipes right out for you this week, Abi). So there you go.

Mazel tov!
-Tracy

  • http://springbok1.livejournal.com/ Abi

    Yummy! I’m looking forward to hovering over a hot stove to try this out (and because any excuse to turn on my stove when it’s below freezing in April is a good thing). Thank you!

    As for matzoh balls, I’ve never tried making them vegan, though I might try that recipe once Passover is done. Those are awfully pretty matzah balls. I generally keep a dairy kitchen, but had my sister bring chicken matzah ball soup for the seder and took appropriate measures. I have to admit that I was awfully partial to the matzah balls my sister made this year where she used rendered chicken fat. :D Also, thanks for pointing me towards Heeb’n Vegan, I’ve now bookmarked it.