Kimchi Quinoa + My New Roots Picnic Potluck

When I was in high school, I had an awesome art teacher who made us vegan ice cream in class. She’s the only person I know who would come to a classroom armed with frozen bananas and a hand blender, prepared to create a healthy dessert for us on the spot. This awesome art teacher also happens to be the genius behind one of my favourite food blogs, My New Roots. Remember that awesome raw cashew dreamcake I made? And those raw vegan ice cream bars that were derived from the raw cashew dreamcake? That was all her. She no longer works at my school, but she’s given TED talks, run yoga-food-cleansing retreats, been featured in issues of Bon Appétit and Oprah magazine, and nominated for Saveur Magazine’s Best Food Blog Award for Special Diets. Just this week, she had a Potluck Picnic In The Park in Toronto, and I went with one of my favourite recipes: kimchi fried quinoa. I know she had posted a kimchi recipe before, but I had no idea how much she loved the fermented veggie until I brought my kimchi dish to the picnic. I’ve always loved kimchi fried rice, but it’s usually made with bacon or fat pork, and not very healthy. Which is a shame, because it’s absolutely delicious! This is my second time making kimchi quinoa, and I decided to take advantage of the local Ontario produce available to me: tricolour carrots, spinach, and spring onions. I used tricolour quinoa instead of just white quinoa, and added sunflower seeds, pumpkin seeds, and alfalfa sprouts. The bonus: it was so flavourful that neither salt or soy sauce was necessary.

I know I said I would share a recipe for grilled eggplant and cajun eggplant, but after popular demand for this recipe at the potluck picnic, I decided I just had to share it. Hopefully I’ll be making my own kimchi soon!

You’ll also find photos of the picnic at the bottom of the post. I had a great time at the potluck and met lots of wonderful veggie-minded food lovers 🙂

(I’ve included photos from the two times I’ve made kimchi quinoa: the first with just white quinoa, the second with tricolour quinoa).

Kimchi Quinoa
2 cups quinoa, cooked
1 cup kimchi (make sure it’s veggie friendly! and add more if you prefer)
3 carrots, chopped
2 cups spinach
1 cup alfalfa sprouts
1/4 cup sunflower seeds and pumpkin seeds, soaked for at least an hour
2 tablespoons fresh ginger, chopped or minced
4 cloves garlic, chopped or minced
3/4 cup spring onions, chopped
coconut oil for cooking
sriracha (optional)

In a large frying pan or wok, heat the coconut oil on medium-high heat. Cook the garlic and ginger until fragrant, and add the spring onions.

Continue to stir. Add the carrots.

Once the carrots have begun to soften, add the spinach and sprouts. Cook for a couple of minutes, before adding the kimchi and increasing the temperature to high heat. Continue to stir-fry.

Pour the quinoa into the pan, stirring to mix well with the rest of the ingredients. Use more coconut oil if the quinoa begins to stick to the pan. Cook for another 5-10 minutes.

Add the seeds, and sriracha if you’d like. Enjoy 🙂

Life Is Like A Dumpling + My New Roots!

*stay posted for the upcoming recipes: grilled eggplant and cajun quinoa and almond ‘pancake’

Wishing you much love and happy kitchen adventures,
Gen

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25 Aug This entry was published on August 25, 2013 at 1:11 am. It’s filed under Dairy-free, Dinner, Gluten-free, Lunch, vegan, Vegetarian and tagged asian food, dairy-free, fermentation, food, fried rice, gluten-free, healthy, kimchi, korean food, quinoa, recipe, vegan, vegetarian. Bookmark the permalink. Follow any comments here with the RSS feed for this post.