COURSE Vegetarian Main Course, or serve with eggs or fish fillet
SERVES 6 - 8
TIME About 30 minutes
Cooking Tips:
The Moroccan inspiration of this recipe comes from the Ras Al Hanout spice mix, which can go quite nicely in various vegetarian dishes.
Cutting vegetable can be a very time consuming task, especially when you are working with root vegetables or winter squashes. I like cut a large batch on Sunday night, and cook through the week.
I like to make a larger batch of the vegetable mix in this dish all at once, and tweak it throughout the week to make different dishes.
I found that vinegar tend to change the taste of the leftover dish and make it too sour the next day. I like to divide the vinegar and only add to the portion that can be eaten on the day of.
Ingredients:
2 Tbsps cooking oil
1 onion, diced
2 cloves of garlic
2 yellow squash or zucchini, cubed
2 bell pepper, diced
1 butternut squash, cut into ¼ to ½ inch cubes
1½ cup of quinoa (raw)
½ cup fresh parsley leaves, or 2 Tbsps dried parsley, optional extra fresh parsley leaves for topping if desire
Salt, to taste
Pepper, to taste
1 Tbsp Ras al Hanout spice mix (see below)
2 lemons, juiced, or 2 Tbsps vinegar (Balsamic vinegar may not work, but all others are fair game)
A handful of cherry tomatoes, halved, to top off the salad (optional)
Ras al Hanout spice mix:
1 teaspoon black pepper
1 teaspoon cardamom
1/4 teaspoon cayenne
1/4 teaspoon ginger powder
1/4 teaspoon nutmeg
1/4 teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon turmeric
Directions:
Heat the oil in a large pot over medium heat. Saute the onion and garlic until they turn a little golden. Add in bell peppers and stir to combine.
Add in butternut squash, and the Ras al hanout spice mix. Stir to combine and cook for 10 - 15 mins, or until the butternut squash is mostly soft.
In a separate pot, boil water and cook the quinoa according to instruction.
Stir in yellow squash or zucchini and cook for 5 more minutes.
Combine the vegetables and quinoa.
Mix in salt, pepper, parsley, and lemon juice or vinegar. Top with the tomatoes and serve. Extra parsley can be used for topping as well.
Vegetable mix:
Salad without the eggs and toppings:
Recipe Inspiration:
This recipe is inspired by the "Quinoa & Ratatouille" recipe published in La Boulange's Cafe Cooking at Home cookbook.
The Ras al Hanout Spice Mix recipe is from "Moroccan Chickpea Barley Salad" recipe posted on Simplyrecipes.com
The Back Story:
A couple years ago, I made a big batch of the Ras al Hanout spice mix after I made the Moroccan Chickpea Barley Salad, which is a wonderful dish, and was very well received by friends and family members. While my children did not appreciate the taste at the time, there were enough positive reviews that led me believe that I will make this dish many times more. However, I have only made this dish once since I made the batch of spice mix. The spice mix was forgotten and got pushed into the back corner of my condiment cabinet.
I recently rediscovered the spice mix and want to find ways to use it. This is one of the dishes I created for this purpose. The dish is very well received, even the kids didn't complain too much.
We often have leftovers in the fridge. However, no one else would want to touch these them after the second day, so I always ended up having to eat everything myself. Tired of eating the same thing, but short on time to cook new food. I started finding ways to make these leftovers more inviting for other family members. By accident, I discovered a four-day lunch series using the same vegetable mix created in this dish. I will be posting this four-day lunch series soon.
Comments