One-Pot Quinoa Dishes

Quinoa is versatile and makes a great base for easy veggie dishes.

Quinoa with lentils, edamame, and other veggies

I cook the quinoa first (one part quinoa to 1.5 parts water, simmer 15 minutes) and get my skillet started by sauteing some onion and garlic in olive oil. I throw the veggies into the skillet for a few minutes then add the cooked quinoa. Easy!

The dish above included some leftover spiced lentils I had, edamame, broccoli, bell pepper, and kale (fresh from the garden).

This one also includes broccoli, pepper, and kale, as well as the Lightlife Smart Strips. Tastes a lot like real chicken, including the texture, so even my meat-eating partner enjoyed this one!

Almost Irish Stew

Slow-cooked vegetarian stew with wheat toast

In celebration of St. Patrick’s Day, I made this recipe from Fresh from the Vegetarian Slow Cooker.

It includes small white potatoes, cannellini beans, baby carrots, kale (fresh from the garden), and bay leaf. The base is vegetable broth, yellow onion, garlic, thyme, dry white wine, soy sauce, and salt. Pretty tasty! I had toast on the side for dipping in the broth.

Beginnings

My partner and I recently became involved in a community garden and I am working on turning my brown thumb green. The community garden is a great way to do this since we can all learn from each other.

We live in Tucson, AZ, and the Sonoran Desert is a pretty harsh environment for gardening (we have little rain and 110 degree summers) – but many have been successful in this environment and our community garden is watered nearly entirely through a rain water harvesting system.

We just planted last weekend: cucumber (seed), red bell pepper (seed), poblano, habanero, fresno (plants), cantaloupe (plant) and two “3 sisters” – different varieties of corn, beans, and squash.

Also we planted an herb garden: thyme, lavender, basil, cilantro, dill (all plants)

In our own garden we have 3 potted veggies – cucumber, tomato, and habanero.

This blog is my attempt to capture what we learn as we go including garden-inspired (mostly) vegetarian dishes we create along the way.