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Quinoa is the new superfood – with a perfect balance of all eight essential amino acids. I had never heard of quinoa before – in fact, our earlier post on Four’s Grilled Salmon with quinoa Tabbouleh was my first introduction to quinoa, but ever since then, I have been noticing it on menus and grocery stores everywhere. When YouCook got ahold of Patricia Green and Carolyn Hemming’s Quinoa 365: The Everyday Superfood book, we were very excited to find out more about quinoa’s nutritional value, and find many different ways to incorporate it into recipes we eat everyday.
Here’s some background on the authors from their website:
Patricia Green
Patricia is a health-conscious mother, balancing family and career while constantly creating nutritious meals tasty enough to please her husband and two active children. Patricia’s post-secondary studies include nutrition, marketing and geography.
Carolyn Hemming
Residing just outside of Toronto, Canada, Carolyn is dedicated to eating right and being physically active. Always busy balancing career & fitness goals, whether she is travelling on business or training for a marathon, Carolyn seeks foods that provide the right balance of energy and nutrition. A sociology and communications graduate, Carolyn’s critical perspective causes her to evaluate every bit of healthy information.
On the nutritional content of quinoa
YouCook: I am so glad to see a section on making your own baby food. Although I don’t have children, my friends are all beginning to start their own families now, and it’s great to see that you can start your children off with a taste for healthier foods. Do you have any advice for the new parents out there who are trying to give their children all of the nutrients they need?
Carolyn: Well, there’s always your physician knows best, they know what nutrients your baby needs. However, what gave us that idea to add that chapter was what we borrowed from the Incans, to wean their children on quinoa. They had really low infant mortality rates. And they were of course very healthy people with very low illness rates. We thought, why don’t we let other people know about it, especially after we were talking to some scientists out in colorado, who studied quinoa. They were also sharing their amazement with us that North American society primarily weans their children on rice pablum, and isn’t it incredulous, that the nutrition value in rice pablum is so minor? And the nutrition in something like quinoa, is exponential. And one of the key parts of that is Histadine which is an essential amino acid. There is a lot of it in quinoa. It is very important to a child’s development. It is the key amino acid for human development. It’s one of those hard to find amino acids.
Patricia: And another thing too, babies also require iron, fortified. quinoa also has iron in it and calcium. So when you think of all that development going on, those items are covered. And it’s also hypo-allergenic, which means when you think of all these allergies to milk and soy and wheat, it gives parents an option, an healthy option, where they’re absorbing nutrition from the food, with no risks from food allergies, and easy digestion.
We have included a baby recipe from the book: Super Quinoa Fruit Puree below.
YouCook: Carolyn, I see that you run marathons. Did you notice any improvement after you started eating quinoa, like in your energy levels?
Carolyn: I do a lot of weight training, and that was probably the biggest place I noticed it. Just really training and lifting weights, and feeling my muscles respond better than they had. Also, my whole life I’ve been a protein shake drinker and supplement user, and when I started using quinoa, I felt like I didn’t need my protein shakes anymore.
Patricia: There is one person that really swears by quinoa, and credits his performance to the use of quinoa. That (person) is Anthony Calvillo. He’s from the Montreal Alouettes.
Carolyn: He’s a professional athlete and of course, the Alouettes won the Grey Cup. He was in the media saying, look, it’s because of quinoa, because his wife had to eat so much coming out of cancer treatment. So he said if you’re going to eat it, I’m going to eat it. During the Grey Cup actually, he had his family making him quinoa, and delivering it to the hotel, because he swears that that has put him in the best shape of his life… This was in the media recently because he was asked if he was ready for retirement, and he said: No way, this is the best shape I’ve ever been in. It wasn’t even an hour after the Grey Cup, and you could see everyone twittering Anthony Calvillo and quinoa. People just started talking about it so fast.
YouCook: What are your next steps in promoting quinoa?
Carolyn: I think it’s part of a big gradual plan. To your point, a lot of people do respond with “What is it?” The awareness piece is not there yet, and there is so much distance to go, that we will do our continued speaking engagements, on what it is, the benefits. I think that could have a lot of longevity. It seems to, just because the awareness is so low right now.
Patricia: We are in constant contact with the growers and manufacturers of quinoa – everyone in the quinoa industry. (We do that) to get more knowledge, what new products are out there, and telling people that this is what they need to know about quinoa. Eventually once it really filters out, maybe we’ll feel like we’ve done our job and can move on to something else.
On inspiration for their recipes and book
YouCook: I love how you have incorporated quinoa in so many different dishes, including desserts. Did you have any previous culinary experience that led to such an expansive array of recipes?
Patricia: Well, I have to say Carolyn and I are very creative people. Like yourself, you do cakes, so you bring your creativity into your cakes. And we do that in our cooking. As far as culinary experience goes, I have had commercial cooking experience, but I’m not working in that industry. Essentially, it’s just a matter of using our creativity and what we knew, and the knowledge that I had from my commercial cooking experience, and start creating recipes.
YouCook: Are there any in here that’s part of your repertoire, that you eat at home?
Patricia: All of them are. My kids will eat everything.
YouCook: So the book is all family-type recipes? What inspired you to write this book?
Patricia: Our goal, initially, was to incorporate quinoa into everything we were already eating, so that we could bring it into our diet. We ended up with a huge collection of recipes that we thought we would share. Because we saw that there was a need, for a book that told people a story. (A book) that used it everyday as opposed to things that, you know, fanatics would make, or maybe foodies and gourmets would make, but what would an everyday person use? How could they incorporate it into everyday meals? And they would enjoy it… It just feels like it can fit right into the average consumer’s diet.
YouCook: Was there any moment where you realized you wanted to write this book?
Patricia: Well, I think when I discovered what quinoa was, and all of its nutritional properties, I started putting it into my everyday meals, I told her (Carolyn) about it, and we both started creating recipes. So we had all these recipes, and there’s no other cookbook on the market. So that’s why we started it, because we could see the need for it.
Carolyn: You could see the (demand) out there, on the blogs and Twitter. People are (asking) “Do you know how to do this with it? Or does anyone know if I’m making this and this; can I put quinoa in it?” Nobody really had the history, the nutrition, you know, just the combination of recipes and everything. So that was the “ah-ha” moment Patricia had that said let’s do this, let’s share our recipes.
Baby Food Recipe: Super Quinoa Fruit Purée
Well, we’ve certainly learned a lot about quinoa. Thanks to Patricia and Carolyn for sharing your quinoa knowledge and recipes with us. Infants and Children actually don’t produce Histidine, Cysteine and Tyrosine making them additional essential amino acids that kids require! Luckily Quinoa has these amino acids as well!! Here’s a healthy recipe from the book to feed babies starting at 6-9 months. If you use this, let us know how your baby liked it!
Ingredients
- 1 cup (250mL) washed/pitted/peeled/diced fruit
- 1/2 cup (125mL) water
- 1 cup (250mL) cooked quinoa
Instructions
1. Combine the diced fruit and water in a large saucepan and bring it to a boil.
2. Cover and reduce to a simmer and cook until fruit is soft (8-10 minutes)
3. Remove from heat and allow to cool.
4. Cook quinoa.
5. Put fruit and cooked quinoa into a blender or food processor.
6. Puree until smooth.
7. Thin the mixture with water or milk until desired consistency is reached.
8. Strain the fruit if a smoother consistency is required.
Storage Instructions
Pour the puree into an ice cube tray and freeze for 5 hours. Remove the frozen cubes from the tray and place into a resealable freezer bag. You can keep it in the freezer for 2 months to maintain best nutritional value.
To service, thaw the cubes in the fridge or a small saucepan on the lowest setting. Thawed puree will stay fresh in sealed container in the fridge for up to 48 hours.
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