The first time I ever ordered quinoa at a restaurant I mispronounced it “keen-oh-a” rather than “keen-wha.” The waiter graciously ignored my mistake and affirmed that the “keen-wha” was very good. Dang it! I felt like I belonged in the hip restaurant, but obviously my non-foodie self had given me away. The quinoa turned out to be so good and I searched for a similar recipe to try out at home. This recipe is very similar with the addition of soaking the quinoa to make it more digestible. Read about the benefits of soaking your grains here. You will love this quinoa!
- 1 cup organic quinoa
- filtered water
- 1 Tbsp of an acidic medium such as whey, yogurt, lemon juice, or apple cider vinegar
- ⅓ cup slivered almonds
- 2 slices pasture-raised bacon, cut into ¼ inch pieces
- 1 small shallot, minced
- 1 cup homemade chicken stock
- 1 sage sprig
- ½ tsp unrefined sea salt
- ½ tsp pepper
- 1 Tbsp fresh chives, minced
- Put quinoa in a glass bowl and add water until it covers the quinoa by a couple inches. Add the acidic medium and stir to combine. Cover and let it sit for 2 hours or more. Drain the quinoa into a fine mesh sieve and rinse thoroughly.
- Heat a high sided pan over medium heat and add the almonds.
- Toast the almonds until lightly browned, about 5 minutes, stirring occasionally. Remove from the pan to cool.
- Add bacon pieces to pan and cook on medium heat until fat has rendered, about 5 minutes.
- Remove bacon from pan leaving the grease.
- Add shallot to pan and cook in grease until softened, but not brown, about 1 minute.
- Add the soaked quinoa, stock, sage, salt, pepper and bring to a boil.
- Cover and cook over low heat until the stock has been absorbed, about 15 minutes.
- Remove the quinoa from the heat and let stand, covered, for 5 minutes.
- Discard the sage sprig and fluff the quinoa with a fork.
- Stir in the bacon, chives, parsley, and toasted almonds.
*Adapted from Bacon Quinoa with Almonds and Herbs at Food & Wine.
*This amount of chicken stock is for soaked quinoa. If using quinoa that has not been previously soaked, follow the amount recommended on the package, probably around 2 cups of stock for every 1 cup of dry quinoa.
*My homemade chicken stock isn’t salty. If using store-bought bouillon in this recipe, you may want to add less salt.
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