Apple cinnamon quinoa oat bites

Apple cinnamon quinoa oat bites

Eat them as a snack or for breakfast! (Note: somehow these are nicer a couple of ours out of the oven instead of eating them straight after baking them!)

I found the recipe on ‘Andtheycookedhappilyeverafter’ and converted and amended it from there as you can see below!

Ingredients (serves 1-2, makes 10-12 bites)

• 90 grams of cooked quinoa (is about 35 grams dry)
• 40 grams of oats

• 1/4 teaspoon of cinnamon

• 1/4 teaspoon of nutmeg (I used allspice)

• 1,5 tablespoons of brown sugar (note: I only used about half)

• 1/2 tablespoon of granulated sugar (note: I only used about half)
• 1/2 tablespoon maple syrup (I used honey)

• 65-ish grams of chopped apple

• 1 lightly beaten egg

How to cook 

1. Cook the quinoa according to instructions and drain well. Even easier if you cook a bunch of it in advance to use for lunches an dinner that week!
2. Pre-heat the oven to about 175 degrees celsius.
3. Mix the spices together in a bowl and add in the quinoa and oats.
4. Add in the maple syrup/honey, apples and your lightly beaten egg and mix it together with a for.
5. Spray your muffin tin or lined oven tray with a bit of oil (line your oven tray with aluminium foil to reduce washing up!)
6. Add about a tablespoon in each muffin cup and spread it out evenly. If you are using an oven tray: scoop a bit of the mixture in your ice scoop (load it up about half full) and release on the baking tray. It should be a slightly domed shape. You can squash it down a bit to get more of a flat cookie shape.
7. Bake your bites for about 15-20 minutes in the oven. Keep an eye on them towards the end. You don’t want to burn them!
8. Once you have taken them out of the oven, let them cool down a bit and then transfer them onto a plate to cool them down a bit more. You probably need a knife if you’ve used a muffin tin to release the bites from the sides of the tin.
9. Leave them for a while and store them in a tupperware container.
10. Enjoy!

Additional notes

• First time I made them I ate one immedately after they came out of the oven and was pretty disappointed. It was a bit cruncy in a way that made me feel like I burnt them. When I’d left them overnight in a tupperware box however they had gone moist again and they were yummy!
• Shaped them in the muffin tin the first time, used a ice scoop the second time.
  Although the ice scoop is easier I found the texture of the muffin-tin ones nicer as they were a bit thinner. The ice-scoop ones were a bit too gooey to my taste. Maybe only fill half the ice-scoop next time!
• Not quite sure how long you can save these for but at least 4 days or so!

Summery quinoa fruit salad

Summery quinoa fruit salad

Have made this super summery quinoa fruit salad twice now and it really is very versatile when it comes to the fruit you can use. Hence two different pictures and loads of optional fruits you can use!
I came across this recipe on a number of blogs and as soon as I manage to find the one I got most of the recipe from I will post a link on here.

Ingredients (serves 1)

Note: Use however much fruit you want and think is one portion. It really all depends on the combination of fruit you use how much to use etc so I’m giving the responsibility to you to do what works best for you. I’m sure you can do it! 😉

• 20-ish grams of Quinoa. Regular (left) or red quinoa (right) OR a combination of the two of course!
• Blueberries
• Strawberries
• Mango (left)
• Pineapple (right)
• Kiwi (right)
• Small handfull of roughly chopped almonds
• 1/2 tablespoon of desiccated coconut to sprinkle on top (optional)

Dressing:

• Juice of 1/2 lime
• 1/2 – 1 tablespoon of honey
• Mint (for dressing and garnish)
• Sprinkle of salt (optional – did not try this myself)

How to prepare

1. Cook the quinoa in advance or cook it while chopping up your fruit and rinse it thoroughly with cold water. Drain as well as you can.
2. Chop up your fruit and mix it together in a bowl with your cold and well drained quinoa.
3. Mix all ingredients for the dressing together and mix it into the bowl of fruit.
4. Put the bowl of fruit with the dressing in the fridge for about an hour to ‘marinate’ 😉 This step is optional btw!.
5. Chop up the almonds and sprinkle over your fruit bowl.
6. Add the desiccated coconut (if you want to) and add extra (chopped up) leaves of mint to taste.
7. Find yourself some sunshine and enjoy!

Additional notes

• As I said: a billion fruit combinations could be made!
• Also pretty damn tasty without the dressing.

Greek lettuce wrap

Greek lettuce wrap

Ingredients (serves 1 )

• A few big iceberg lettuce leaves. As many as you need to make a solid wrap out if it without stuff falling out of it.
• 50-ish grams of feta cheese
• 35-ish grams of red quinoa & normal quinoa (just normal quinoa should be fine as well!)
• sundried tomatoes
• green pesto
• cucumber
• mini tomatoes
• black pepper

How to cook (Pretty fast and easy recipe really!)

1. Cook the quinoa according to instructions
2. Layer your iceberg lettuce leaves until you have a solid wrap.
3. Cut up your veggies and drain and slice up your sundried tomatoes.
4. Put your green leaves on a plate and add in the quinoa, sun dried tomatoes, veggies and add in a teaspoon of green pesto and black pepper to taste.
5. Mix together and crumble your feta on top. Try and mix it in a little.
6. Eat as a salad or close the lettuce leaves and eat as a wrap (the latter is easier when it comes to taking it to work as well! However I do have to say, it is a bit messy when trying to eat it ;))
7. Enjoy!

Additional notes

• Perfect to take to work without your wrap getting soggy etc!
• As with the lettuce wrap recipe I posted recently; you can make a million and one combinations and variations!
• Replace quinoa with bulgar wheat or another type of grainy carb.
• Green pesto can be replaced with red pesto or even different types of hummus such as red pepper hummus! YUM.
• Feta could be replaced by some nicely spiced chicken or even some avocado.

Mutated chicken biryani

Use your imagination and add the quinoa to the picture.

I adapted the Schwartz Chicken Biryani and later on started using Tikka Masala spices instead of Biryani spices.
Seems they unfortunately don’t sell those packets anymore.. so am going to have to find out if their new Biryani and Tikka Masala spices are different or not… (they do look like it..)

Ingredients (serves 1)

• 35-45 grams of quinoa (can also be replaced by rice, couscous and bulgar wheat)
• 125 grams of chicken
• 1 tomato (or more if you really like tomato!)
• Mushrooms
• 150-ish grams of green beans
• Biryani or Tikka Masala spices (soo… not quite sure the Schwartz ones will do.. to be continued..!)
• Garlic (half a clove)
• Chicken spices
• Black pepper + other seasoning to taste
• Sesame seeds (optional)

How to cook 

1. Wash and cut up your green beans. Cook them for about 5 minutes. Until they are tender but definitely not soft!
2. Cook your quinoa according to instructions
3. Cut up the chicken into small pieces and fry them with a bit of oil in a pan. Best to marinate chicken beforehand – but let’s be honest – we don’t have time for that. I usually just add them just before or at the start of frying the chicken.
4. Don’t forget to add in a bit of garlic if you want!
5. Cut up your mushrooms and add the mushrooms to the pan when the chicken is cooked.
6. Cut up the tomato in small pieces and add when the mushrooms are cooked.
7. Drain your green beans and add to the pan. Now also add in some of the biryani or tikka masala spices and other seasoning to taste. Let it sit for a while so the flavours can be soaked up into the food. Stir occasionally!
8. Drain your quinoa and put it on your plate.
9. Serve the ‘mutated chicken biryani’ with your quinoa and… Enjoy!

Additional notes

• Easy to microwave!
• Can be eaten cold! Not my favourite.. but you know.. just in case the microwave at work starts to look and sound like it is about to explode the safer option is to just eat it..
• Will hopefully have an update on the spices soon…

Quinoa, broccoli, goats cheese

Photo by Carla Berkers. (Quinoa buried by other ingredients ;))

Ingredients (serves 1)

• 35-45gr Quinoa
• 150gr? — 1/2 broccoli
• 60gr? soft goats cheese
• chopped nuts (mixed or just walnuts / pecan nuts)
• Pomegranate seeds (however many is good in comparison)
• Some black pepper / seasoning of choice
• 2-ish teaspoons honey

How to cook 

1. Cook the quinoa according to instructions
2. Chop up the broccoli in medium sized florets (or however you like it) and cook them until they are edible to you 😉
3. Once the quinoa is cooked, put into a bowl and add in the warm broccoli, crumbled soft goats cheese, chopped nuts/walnuts, pomegranate seeds and mix while putting in the honey and seasoning with a bit of pepper.
4. Done and ready to serve!

Additional notes

• Nuts could potentially be replaced by sunflower seeds.
• Could potentially add chicken.
• If you want to make it for work, try to keep the goats cheese (or if not possible at least the pomegranate seeds) separate. Microwave until luke-warm and add pomegranate seeds and goats cheese.
• Can be eaten cold.

Fresh quinoa salad with pomagranate

Ingredients (serves 1)

• 35-45gr Quinoa
• 1/4 cucumber
• 1/2 Avocado
• 50-100gr Spinach
• Pomagranate seeds (however many is good in comparison)
• 1tbs sunflower seeds
• Couple of mint leaves
• Some black pepper / seasoning of choice
• Some lime to sprinkle on top if you wish (I don’t really do that anymore these days)

How to cook 

1. Cook the quinoa according to instructions – drain and rinse with cold water.
2. Chop up the cucumber and avocado. I prefer to dice up the cucumber quite small (1/6th)
3. Chop up the spinach to be as small as possible. (preferably smaller than on the picture ;))
4. Mix everything together, add the sunflower seeds and add in as many pomegranate sees as you want. Try and keep it in proportion 😉
5. Add in mint leaves and mix. A couple of leaves chopped up finely is usually enough. You don’t want too little and don’t want too much 😉

Additional notes

• Might be nice with chicken.
• Best eaten cold!
• Pomegranates are cheapest in winter – but the salad’s freshness makes it a perfect summer dish!
• Wonder if adding ginger would be nice…
• Can also be a nice side-dish to salmon, white fish or chicken!
• Quinoa could potentially be replaced by couscous.