Red Quinoa Salad: I Was Wrong

I am going to say it here and I am going to say it now: I was wrong about quinoa.

I think my mother may be laughing.

You see, she’s been trying to get me to like quinoa (pronounced “keen-wa”) for years . It’s super healthy—considered the best source of protein in the vegetable kingdom. Quinoa has been around for ages, used by the Inca in South America who called it the “Mother Grain.” When the Spanish marched into the Inca Empire in the 1500s, they found that the people lived on three main foods—corn, potatoes, and quinoa, a grain that could be grown at high altitudes, needed little rainfall to support it, and thrived in poor alkaline soil (technically quinoa isn't a grain, it's a seed, but no matter). It’s even speculated that the Spanish suppressed the cultivation of quinoa as a way to keep the Inca down.

But I never liked it.

I didn’t like the texture—roly-poly in my mouth—and I thought it had a tiny bit of bitterness. Mainly it just seemed blah. My mom would cook it occasionally and I never wanted to eat it. “But it’s good for you,” she told me. “It has all the essential amino acids—and the most protein of any grain.”

Didn’t matter, I don’t like quinoa.

Then, a few months ago, a friend convinced me to go to Café Gratitude. I generally give such places a pass (I got enough of the real hippies and their health food when I was growing up, thank you very much). But trust a vegan hippie restaurant to know their grains. This place serves up a really good bowl of quinoa. I didn’t order it myself—I don’t like quinoa, remember—but I agreed to taste my friend’s quinoa. It was nice and light and fluffy, with little trace of the bitterness that I remember.

Hmmm.

Then, when I was cleaning out all the back corners of the kitchen cupboards before I left San Francisco, I found a box of organic red quinoa that I don’t even remember buying. I must have purchased it in a well-intentioned phase of trying to cook healthier; It hadn’t ever been opened (we can see how far those phases go).

I admit that it was just a wee bit beyond its expiration date (but nowhere near as bad as the other items I found that had expired in 2000!). It was still sealed and looked fine, and I can’t stand to throw out food, so I put it in the box of things to bring to Washington. After all, it is gluten-free—and, have you heard, it has the most protein of any grain.

One day last week I opened up the package and, after sniffing carefully, poured the red quinoa into a pot of boiling water and cooked it up. And you know what—I like red quinoa! Perhaps the red variety doesn’t have the same shade of bitterness that I tasted before, or perhaps my taste buds have just grown into the flavor as I’ve gotten older, but I like quinoa, I really do.



Turns out that roly-poly-ness, which I always complained about, is actually a lovely texture. The bitterness I remember probably comes from the fact that quinoa has a resin-like substance called saponin that coats the grains while it is growing. This discourages the birds and bugs, but must be removed once the grain is harvested. To do so the quinoa is cleaned with an akaline solution that can leave behind a bitter residue. This is easily taken care of with a pre-cooking rinse, but if not rinsed thoughly the grain may taste slightly bitter.

But fully rinsed and cooked, it has a delicious nutty flavor and a texture that reminds me of tobiko—that small crunch in your mouth feeling. I like quinoa, I really do.

Mixed into a salad, with crunchy red radish, tomatoes, fresh oregano, red onion, chopped up capers, goat cheese, and vinaigrette dressing, I like it even more.



And, you know, it’s really good for you. Has the most protein of any grain.

Go ahead, mom, you can laugh, but I’m feeding you quinoa next time you come to visit.

RED QUINOA SALAD
Serves two

1 cup organic red quinoa
2 cups water
6 radishes chopped in a medium dice, about 1 1/2 cups
Half a small red onion, cut into a small dice
1 large tomato, or equal amount of cherry tomatoes (1 cup) chopped
3/4 cup crumbled goat cheese
2 tbs. capers, chopped coarsely
2 tsp chopped fresh oregano (could use fresh parsley, or skip entirely)

1 tbs Dijon mustard
4 tbs red wine vinegar
1/3 cup olive oil
Salt and pepper to taste

Bring the water to a boil and pour the dry quinoa in, cook for until all the water has absorbed and the quinoa is done—about 15-20 minutes (you can also cook quinoa in a rice cooker).

Let the quinoa cool and then toss with all the salad ingredients except the cheese.

Whisk the mustard and vinegar together until smooth, begin to drizzle olive oil in, whisking constantly, until the mixture begins to emulsify. Add salt and pepper to taste.

Pour dressing over salad, toss to mix, adjust seasonings. Fold cheese in carefully at the end, so as not to get all mushy.



Of course, I am not the first food blogger to go nutty over quinoa (have I mentioned that is has a lovely nutty flavor?). Check out these:

Autumn Squash, Red Pepper, and Red Quinoa on Gluten-free Girl.
Belly Timber's Quinoa crusted salmon with baby bok choy.
Gaspers Block primer on quinoa, with four recipes.
Quinoa Vegetable Paella from Fat-Free Vegan Kitchen.
Mexican-style Quinoa Black Bean Salad at Savvy Vegetarian
Quinoa Salad with Mango and Walnuts at YumSugar
And of course, Heidi likes quinoa—check out her Quinoa Big Bowl on 101 Cookbooks

There are more quinoa recipes in Heidi's New Book, Super Natural Cooking:
how about Quinoa and Corn Flour Crepes with Chile de Arbol Sauce, or Quinoa and Crescenza with Sauteed Mushrooms, or Red Quinoa-Walnut Cookies? Yum.

What a surprise, these days I can't get enough quinoa.
And yes, sometimes mom does know best.