The Food Site

This is a continuation of my how to cook quinoa recipes where I try all sorts of ways to cook quinoa. As you may well know, I’ve already mentioned before about the health benefits of quinoa and how it is a great replacement for rice. It is also gluten-free and high in iron, amongst other things.

This time around, I tried a very simple quinoa recipe with canned sardines. We happen to opened a can of sardines a few days back and I’ve some leftovers so I used it to cook it with quinoa instead. It turned out pretty good too. This further proves that quinoa is extremely versatile and goes quite well with almost anything.

As you can see, I also added some tomatoes and mushrooms to make it a complete meal by itself. So, this dish is more like an all-in-one healthy dinner. It has grains, fish and vegetables.

Quinoa recipes: Red Quinoa and sardines

Ingredients

1/2 cup red quinoa

1 cup boiling water

2 canned sardines in tomato sauce + 6 tbsp of the sauce

2 rose onions, chopped

5 cherry tomatoes, diced

5 fresh shiitake mushrooms, diced

3 button mushrooms, diced

3 tbsp ketchup

2 dried chilies, chopped

a few leaves of parsley

Instructions

1. Soak and rinse the quinoa. Then heat up a non-stick pan and stir fry the quinoa till it is dried up.

2. Add in the onions, tomatoes, chilies and mushrooms. Stir fry for a bit.

3. Add the sardines, sauce and ketchup and throw in the parsley. Stir to mix well. Add the boiling water. Stir and lower heat to medium low. Cover and let it simmer for about 20 minutes. Remember to stir it every five minutes to prevent it from burning.After 20 minutes, turn off the heat and let it stand covered for another 5 minutes.

It is done when the quinoa is fluffed up and looks like fish roe as below:

For a really balanced meal, serve it on a bed of fresh green vegetables like this…

Cod fish is sort of a luxury food for us due to its rarity in the wet markets and its highly expensive pricing since it’s an imported fish. However, we do buy some frozen cod fish once in a while from one of the distributors here and I’d try a few ways to cook it.

Since I am most adept at cooking the Chinese way (meaning stir frying most of the time), I thought maybe I could use almost the same way to cook cod fish. And this is what I made…

**Cod fish in mushrooms and herbs sauce**

It is pretty easy to cook and the sauce gave the codfish a nice herby and mushroomy flavor. This is what I do:

Fusion cod fish recipe: Codfish in Mushrooms and Herbs Sauce

Ingredients

2 pcs codfish

1 tsp sea salt

1 tbsp garlic powder

1/2 cup plain flour

5 fresh shiitake mushrooms, sliced thinly

4 tbsp chopped fresh mixed herbs

1/2 clove garlic, diced

2 tbsp oyster sauce

2 tbsp light soy sauce

5 tbsp extra virgin olive oil

1/4 cup water

Instructions

1. Season the codfish with salt, garlic powder and rub the flour all over it

2. Heat up about 3 tbsp of cooking oil in a non-stick pan and shallow fry the fish until it turns brown. Make sure to fry both sides till it is cooked through.

3. Remove the fish and place on a plate. Do not clean out the cooking pan as it already has the nice codfish juices in it. Instead, add the remaining cooking oil and then sautée the garlic over medium heat till fragrant.

4. Add the mushrooms and stir fry it till fragrant. Then add in the sauces and the herbs. Stir fry it a while before pouring in the water.

5. Let it simmer over medium heat

6. Remove from heat and pour it over the cooked cod fish.

Serve the cod fish hot or else it will become soggy

Codfish in mushrooms and herbs sauce

Eating codfish is good for you as it is rich in Omega-3, thus making it a heart-healthy food and also one of those foods that could prevent cancer. Do try to consume fish at least two times a week.