The inspiration from this dish came from clean eating, but the original recipe was more than a little bland for my tastes. It also had mushrooms, which we don’t eat. If you do, I would think that they would be really good in this dish. You can leave the goat cheese out if you are watching calories, but I think it would be a little bland without it.
Quinoa Risotto with Butternut Squash
Servings
Ingredients
- 3 cup butternut squash diced
- olive oil spray
- sea salt
- Freshly ground black pepper
- 2 cup vegetable broth
- ½ cup white wine
- 1 cup quinoa rinsed
- 1 onion finely diced
- 1 red pepper finely diced
- ½ teaspoon sea salt
- ½ teaspoon pepper
- 1/8 to ¼ teaspoon cayenne pepper
- 1 tablespoon olive oil
- 4-6 cloves garlic minced
- 1 tablespoon fresh thyme
- 1 tablespoon fresh sage minced
- 1 cup thawed frozen peas
- 3 ounce goat cheese
- ¼ cup parmesan cheese
- 2 tablespoon walnuts toasted
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 425 degrees. Spray olive oil on the diced butternut squash and toss. Season with salt and pepper. Place on a rimmed baking sheet and bake for 30 minutes, tossing occasionally.
- Bring broth to simmer over medium heat. Keep warm.
- Sauté onion and pepper in olive oil over medium high heat for 8 minutes, stirring often. Lower heat to medium. Add garlic and stir for 30 seconds. Add rinsed quinoa and cook 2 minutes more.
- Add wine, salt and cayenne pepper. Cook until wine has absorbed and then add in just enough vegetable broth to cover. Continue stirring frequently and adding broth until all but ½ cup of the broth has been added. This should take about 20 minutes.
- Add in thyme, sage, peas and goat cheese. Stir for two minutes and then remove pan from heat. (There will still be a little liquid remaining. )
- Add in squash and walnuts. Place on a plate and garnish with parmesan cheese.
- Credit: Wendy Polisi
I made this for rosh hashana meal that was gluten free to accommodate one of our guests. I made it pareve (left out the cheeses), and because we don’t eat nuts on rosh hashana, left out the walnuts too. It got rave reviews, and the dish did not feel like it was missing anything!
Looks delicious and what a creative way to use quinoa. Goat cheese too…mmmm!