Thursday, October 30, 2008

QUINOA CAKES


Today I Made:
QUINOA CAKE OVER SMOKY CALYPSO BEAN SAUCE, CURRIED SQUASH, AND MANGO-HABANERO-COCONUT SAUCE for DINNER.
Recipe from THE ARTFUL VEGAN by ERIC TUCKER.
Executive chef of Millenium Restaurant in San Francisco.
The book describes it as being  a Carribbean inspired dish with many layers of flavors.
This dish has so many ingredients and flavors that my head started to spin when I was preparing it.

I counted over 33 ingredients:
1. Habanero chile
2. Mango
3. Coconut Milk
4. Red Onions
5. Garlic
6. Sugar
7. Dried Thyme
8. Ground Allspice
9. Ground Cloves
10. Kidney Beans
11. Vegetable Stock
12. Ground Cumin
13. Fennel seeds
14. Curry Powder
15. Ground Nutmeg
16. Vegetable Oil
17. Yellow Onions
18. Garlic
19. Fresh Ginger
20. Butternut Squash
21. Juice of 1 Orange
22. Collard Greens
23. Extra Virgin Olive Oil
24. Juice of 1 Lemon
25. Celery
26. Carrot
27. Oregano
28. Corn
29. Pistachio nuts
30. Quinoa
31. Corn Masa
32. Salt
33. Pepper

There are 5 different components to this recipe.
1. Mango-Habanero-Coconut Sauce
2. Smoky-Calypso Bean Sauce
3. Curried Winter Squash
4. Collard Greens
5. Quinoa Cakes

To plate the dish, you first spoon the bean sauce into a large pasta bowl. 
Then you mound a small amount of the collard greens in the center of the plate.
The quinoa cake goes on top, then you spoon about 1/2 cup of the squash curry over the cake.
And finally, you drizzle a small amount of the mango sauce over the entire dish.
You can also add some toasted pistachios. 

Overall, it took me 3 hours to complete this dish.
So even though I was tired, it was all worth it when I heard my husband utter these words after taking his first bite, " THIS IS SO ****ING DELICIOUS!"
And I give myself a pat on the back for even trying to accomplish this dish.
If I can cook a gourmet dish, so can YOU!

5 comments:

Sal - AlienOnToast said...

sounds like too much work for lazy me but it looks really awesome!!

Anonymous said...

I think once a week there should be time to prepare such a dish. It sounds and looks amazing!

Bethany said...

that's what every cook loves to hear after making any recipe. Especially a 3 hour cooking fest.

Looks awesome!

River (Wing-It Vegan) said...

WOW that dish looks so gourmet! So many ingredients, I bet it was a lot of work!

Michelle said...

Oh my, I'd have to have hired staff for my kitchen to pull that off!