Quinoa Pad Thai

I've seen various Quinoa Pad Thai recipes floating around the internet and decided to try my hand at making it.  I started with a basic recipe but quickly threw it out when I didn't have some of the main ingredients.

Also, we've been calorie counting so I'm giving you the measurements as I measured them ... in grams.   (If your kitchen scale is like mine, it should measure in both ounces and grams!)

This was a hit.  All four of us really liked it.  Even the kids, who will swear up and down that they don't like quinoa ... except tonight they are all "oh, yeah, I like that one quinoa dish with haloumi in it."  ... "And this one ..."  and I'm sure there are more, they just can't remember right now!!

Here's what you need:

4.5 cups cooked quinoa (I did two cups raw in my rice cooker)
70g bean sprouts
175g wombok (chinese cabbage), thinly sliced
120g grated carrots
45g sliced spring onions (and more to serve)
2 eggs
1 chicken breast, cooked and diced
4 cloves garlic, minced
2 tsp canola oil

Sauce:
3 Tablespoons brown sugar
4 Tablespoons lime juice (I used bottled because I only had one lime- you may not need as much with fresh limes)
zest of one lime (I added this because it wasn't limey enough ... you may not need it at all)
3 Tablespoons fish sauce
1 teaspoon chili garlic sauce

1/4 cup chopped peanuts, to serve
1/2 cup cilantro (fresh coriander), to serve

Here's what you do:

Mix sauce ingredients and set aside.  You'll want to taste as you mix with this.  If it's too sweet, add more lime juice.  You want it to be more lime than sweet, I think, though.  And you don't want the fish sauce to be too overpowering.   If you are in the States, you may want to start with way less fish sauce.  Ellie told me that fish sauce is much stronger there than it is here ...

In a large frying pan, heat 2 tsp oil over medium heat.  Add minced garlic, cook for a couple of minutes until just starting to brown.  Add bean sprouts, wombok, carrots and spring onions.   Cook for 2-3 minutes or until beginning to soften.  Add chicken, quinoa and sauce.  Stir to combine.  Cook for a bit, letting the bottom lightly brown and then stirring to the top, letting the bottom brown just a little bit each time. (Like when you make fried rice ...)  In the meantime, beat the two eggs in a bowl and pour into a small, heated non-stick frying pan.  Cook a thin 'omelet'.

Slice 'omelet' into long thin strips.

To serve.  Put quinoa on a nice serving platter, top with omelet strips, peanuts, cilantro and extra spring onions.  Drizzle with a bit of lime and serve with two halves of lime on side of platter.

This fed our family of 4 quite nicely.

Asian Ginger Sesame Chicken Salad

I found this recipe, originally from Curtis Stone in Redbook and just had to try it.
I made a couple of small changes ... 

This first bit is the ingredients for the dressing.  You'll use a little bit of it for the marinade as well.
 
1/4 cup soy sauce
fresh ginger, finely grated (recipe called for a 3 inch piece, I reckon I used a 1 inch piece) 
1/4 cup canola oil 
2 Tbsp hoisin sauce 
1 Tbsp sesame oil 
1 tsp sriracha sauce 
1 tsp kosher salt 
2 large chicken breasts, boneless and skinless 
1/4 cup red wine vinegar 
1/4 cup finely chopped spring onions 

These ingredients are for the salad part of it.  

1/4 to 1/2 a Wombok (Chinese cabbage), very thinly sliced 
2 carrots, grated  
3 spring onions, thinly sliced 
fresh coriander, coarsely chopped (I  just threw in a bunch, it's really to taste) 
1/2 cup slivered almonds 
(I was in a hurry and just threw all nuts & seeds in straight out of freezer) 
a small handful of white sesame seeds 
a small handful black sesame seeds

In a bowl, whisk together first seven ingredients.

Put the chicken into a large ziplock bag and spoon in 4 tablespoons of the dressing.  Zip the bag, removing air as you go.  Rub the marinade all over the chicken, then pound it to get the chicken all the same thickness.  Marinate the chicken for at least 30 minutes.

With the remaining dressing in the bowl, add the red wine vinegar and spring onions.  Set aside.  This is your dressing.

Grill the chicken.  Rory did ours on the BBQ but you could do it inside ... just get it cooked.  The original recipe said to let it rest 15 minutes ... oops, didn't read that bit.  We probably only let it rest 5 minutes.  It was delicious.

Let it rest if you like ... then cut it into slices, chunks, whatever you prefer. 

Add salad ingredients to large bowl.  Add chicken.  Mix.  

We used the dressing to top individual salads as we served so that the leftovers wouldn't be soggy the next day ... 

Ellie's Asian Chicken with a Simple Side of Quinoa Salad

One night I rocked up at my sister's house to pick her up, maybe for the Keith Urban concert? Or maybe it was before we went to Zumba?  In any case, it was dinner time for her family and she had whipped up this beautiful chicken dish which I tasted on the way out the door!  It was delicious and I immediately wrote the 'recipe' in my phone.  Last night, I was thinking about what to cook and I remembered ....

She didn't give me any measurements, just ingredients so last night I wrote down what measurements I used.  I think that you could do them to any measure and it would be good but here's what I did to serve four of us.

2 chicken breasts, sliced

Marinate in:
Soy sauce, 4 Tablespoons

Honey, 2 Tablespoons

Lime, juice of one

White wine or sake, 4 Tablespoons

Garlic, 6 cloves

When you are ready to cook, dredge chicken in flour and fry in batches.  I shallow fried in grapeseed oil.

Trying to use up some of the veggies that are leftover at the end of a weeks worth of cooking, I make this simple side to go with it.  It's not got many strong flavors, really it's just the fresh taste of veggies and a little bit of lime juice.  You could totally dress it if you wanted it a bit more punchy. 

 

Again, there are no real measurements for this salad.  I'll tell you what I did but you can add whatever you like, really!

1 cup quinoa, cooked (I used a tri colored one)

2 roma tomatoes, finely diced

2 spring onions, finely dices

1/2 a red capsicum (bell pepper), finely diced

1/2 a yellow capsicum (bell pepper), finely diced

1/2 an avocado, finely diced

a large chunk of cucumber, finely diced

juice of half a lime 

sprinkle of sea salt

mix all ingredients. serve.

Spinach, Tofu, Avocado Salad with Sesame Soy Dressing

 

This is a little Bonnie invention.

 There are no real measurements for the salad part, just add ingredients as they look good.

Baby Spinach Leaves, finely sliced

Cucumber, finely diced

Cilantro (Fresh Coriander Leaves), finely chopped

Snow Pea Sprouts, finely chopped

Toasted cashews, roughly chopped

Spring Onions, finely diced

Avocado, chopped small

Silken tofu, small pieces

Dressing:

2 tablespoons mirin

3 tablespoons soy sauce

1 teaspoon sesame oil

1 teaspoon honey

Make the dressing by mixing all ingredients.  I do it in a small mason jar so that I can heat the mixture a bit in the microwave to help the honey mix in.  Also, it's then easy to pop the lid on to save the leftovers.

Make the salad by combining all ingredients as indicated above.  Originally I was going to chop the tofu but when I tipped it out of it's box, it basically crumbled so I just scooped up pieces of the crumble and added it to the salad.

I made a variation for lunch a few days later.  It was yummy.  I didn't have any tofu and I forgot the cashews.  I added finely diced fuji apple and toasted sesame seeds.  Everything else was the same.

Japanese Mince and Rice ....

This is so yummy and so simple. Last time I made this, I had some ground beef (mince) already cooked and in the freezer. I took that out in the morning to thaw, set the timer on the rice cooker and then only had one step to do when I got home.

Here's what you do.

500g beef mince

cooked rice (i like sushi rice best)

3 Tablespoons Sake

3 Tablespoons Mirin

3 Tablespoons Soy Sauce

All you do is cook the mince in a bit of oil, add the sake, mire and soy and continue to cook until the juice is gone. I did this on a med heat. Then you just stir that through the rice. You can shape it into onigiri (as shown below) or just eat it. Lately, we've opted to just eat it !! 

And  I add a little bit more soy sauce to my bowl ...

Wombok Salad

This is adapted from the recipe on the back of the packet of Fried Noodles

1 wombok (chinese cabbage)
6 spring onions
100 g lightly roasted slivered almonds
1 pack (100g) Fried Noodles

1/4 cup vinegar
1/4 cup sugar
1 Tablespoon soy sauce
2 teaspoons sesame oil
1/2 cup olive oil

Throw all the dressing ingredients together. Microwave for a minute or two ... not too hot. Just to help the sugar dissolve.

Chop the cabbage and onions and toss with rest of ingredients. I sometimes add sliced snow peas too, when I have them.

Top with dressing. YUM YUM YUM !!!