Ruby Quinoa

Okay, first things first, credit for this recipe goes to The Olive Press for their Lemon-Infused Ruby Quinoa. I am struggling to take close up photos that get the details of the quinoa. Their photo is much better, so go check it out if you want to see how beautiful Ruby Quinoa looks.

Grating Beets for Ruby Quinoa

While a cup of quinoa was cooking in two cups of water, I grated beets on an old school grater. I have a food processor, but it isn't a very good one and hardly worth the effort to clean. I cut the beets on a glass cutting board so I wouldn't stain my plastic one.

What If I Grate Too Many Beets?

Turns out my 4 beets grated up into more than a cup total. No worries, I threw all the beets in with the quinoa.

I have to admit that at this time, I was skeptical. I tasted the beets and quinoa together with 2 tablespoons of olive oil and it seemed dull and earthy. I went along with the recipe but I wasn't expecting to like the final product.

Lotsa Lemon

After the beets and quinoa had 10 minutes to make their marriage permanent, I cut a slice from the center of a large lemon to use for garnish and then I squeezed all of the juice of the rest of the lemon into the quinoa.

I didn't have any parsley, but I did have 1/4 cup of mint with no planned destination that I recruited for the recipe. I chopped up the mint and stirred it in.

Unfortunately, my zester is the same tool I used to grate the beets. I think I need to buy something smaller and more suited to the task because most of the zest remained on the grater. It's anyone's guess whether there was a teaspoon of zest in the final dish.

I stirred this all together and then took the photos that don't do this dish justice.

Ruby Quinoa Is Much Better Than I Thought It Would Be.

Turns out not only is this dish simply gorgeous in color, but it also tastes pretty darn good. The hot quinoa must cook the grated beets or something - altogether it works well. Good comfort food on a cold and rainy November afternoon.

I will try this again with a little rice vinegar to see if I prefer it with a little more kick, but this Ruby Quinoa recipe has my approval just as it is.

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