Wednesday, February 18, 2009

Wild Rice, Quinoa and Coconut Pilaf

This recipe pretty much has Berkeley and the Summer of Love written all over it but it's quite terrific.

Ingredients

1 cup wild rice (rinsed)
1/2 cup quinoa (rinsed)

1" ginger (grated)
3 Thai chillies (diced into rounds)
1 tsp mustard seeds
3 cardamom pods

1/2 cup dried unsweetened coconut
1/2 cup chopped walnuts

salt
black pepper

lime juice
1/2 cup chopped cilantro (missing in picture below)

Recipe

Boil the wild rice with salt at medium heat for 30 minutes. Add the quinoa and continue cooking it for an additional 20 mins. Drain if necessary.

Heat a wok with some oil. Fry the mustard seeds until they pop. Add the black pepper, cardamom, ginger, chillies and fry for a bit. Add the walnuts and coconut and fry for a bit.

Toss in the wild rice-quinoa mixture. Add the cilantro, and adjust the salt to taste. A squeeze of lime livens up the taste.

3 comments:

macavity said...

I saw this in the NY Times... except that Mark Bittman did it with oats.

ShockingSchadenfreude said...

And no walnuts. Nor lime.

There are whole buncha similar recipes floating around.

Some with raisins. Some with pecans, etc. etc. etc.

The idea is pretty generic: spices, cereals, nuts, some sweetening thing, and keep all the textures separate.

ShockingSchadenfreude said...

Something that wasn't mentioned.

While this is delicious warm, it is really superlative the next day at room temperature.

It really is the perfect "picnic food".