quinoa

Dragon Mood? -- happy dragon tummy

While this may sound strange, I've been wanting to blog about quinoa.

What the heck is that? Quinoa (pronounced keen-wah) is a rather plain-looking grain that I capriciously picked up that turns out to be a superhero in disguise. Like most middle-aged, slightly overweight people with high cholesterol, high triglycerides AND insulinemia, I'm trying to eat more whole grains. (And like many middle-aged folks, I have a slight and foggy memory that someone mentioned it to me first. Is that true?)

[I do have to laugh, because I have truly come full circle. When I was young, married and idealistic, my husband and I were vegetarians. I worked at the local food co-op twice a week, for both philosophical and economic reasons. Then we started eating meat, he voted Republican, I got divorced . . . and now look: I'm back to eating whole grains. Isn't life funny?]

Since I'm no nutritional expert, here's what Whole Health MD has to say:

Nutritionally, quinoa might be considered a supergrain--although it is not really a grain, but the seed of a leafy plant that's distantly related to spinach. Quinoa has excellent reserves of protein, and unlike other grains, is not missing the amino aicd lysine, so the protein is more complete (a trait it shares with other "non-true" grains such as buckwheat and amaranth). The World Health Organization has rated the quality of protein in quinoa at least equivalent to that in milk. Quinoa offers more iron than other grains and contains high levels of potassium and riboflavin, as well as other B vitamins: B6, niacin, and thiamin. It is also a good source of magnesium, zinc, copper, and manganese, and has some folate (folic acid).

An ancient grainlike product that has recently been "rediscovered" in this country, quinoa has a light, delicate taste, and can be substituted for almost any other grain.

There's more good stuff about quinoa, but suffice to say it's on my eating list now, along with golden flaxseed and good ol' oatmeal.

I want to compliment Carolina, who fixed quinoa for all of us over the New Year's weekend. She said she cooked it like oatmeal, adding a touch of brown sugar and a pinch of black pepper, along with a handful of craisins (dried, raisin-like cranberries?) It was positively yummy! Thanks, Lina!