Quinoa Madness!

As I mentioned in another post, I am in the process of cleaning out our kitchen cabinets in anticipation of our move to Boston in a little over 2 weeks (17 days, to be exact!)  I used up some left over red lentils in a very yummy Spiced Lentil recipe I found, but now I am confronted with a bunch of quinoa.

I have a lot of go to recipes for quinoa, usually in some sort of whole grain salad or curry recipe.  But I wanted to try something a little different.  In my perusing of the Internet, looking for that something interesting, I found exactly what I was looking for!  This fantastic recipe for quinoa pudding!  I am a HUGE rice pudding fan(I also love grape nut pudding.  If you don't know what that is, you need to move to New England!), but have never thought of using quinoa in a pudding.  After making this recipe, I am a convert. Give it a try.

Quinoa Pudding

1 1/2 cups water

3/4 cup quinoa

2 cups soy or almond milk

2 ripe bananas

2 tablespoons brown sugar

salt to taste

1/2 tablespoon butter

1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract (you can use vanilla soy or almond milk and omit the extract)

Rinse and drain the quinoa. Bring water and quinoa to a boil in a saucepan over high heat, stirring occasionally. Reduce heat, cover, and simmer for 15 minutes, until liquid is absorbed. Remove from the heat.

Blend together the milk, bananas, sugar, and salt in the bowl of a blender or food processor until smooth. Pour the milk mixture into the saucepan with the quinoa.

Place the pan over medium heat. Cook and stir until the mixture becomes thick and creamy, 5 to 10 minutes. Remove from the heat. Stir in the butter and vanilla and serve warm.