Vegan-4-A-Day challenge post!

I saw this challenge on Eating Journey's blog and thought I would do a post for all of you out there new to vegan eating! Even though I am a vegetarian, we have moved to more of a vegan direction, so most of my meals are vegan! I've gotten some great recipes from some great cookbooks, but this recipe was actually from allrecipes.com. I love that site! It has recipes for just about everything! O-kay, here's the recipe:

Quinoa and Black Beans

Ingredients:
*1 tsp. vegetable oil/vegie broth
*1 onion, chopped
*3 cloves garlic, peeled and chopped
*3/4 C uncooked quinoa (if your quinoa hasn't been pre-rinsed, make sure you rinse your quinoa well to remove the bitter saponins)
*1 1/2 C vegetable broth (I used a low sodium version)
*1 tsp. ground cumin
*1/4 tsp. cayenne pepper (I used 1/8 tsp. b/c of my two boys!)
*Salt and pepper to taste
*1 (15oz) can black beans, rinsed and drained (I used the unsalted version)
*1 C frozen corn kernels
*1/2 C chopped fresh cilantro (optional - I'm not a big cilantro fan, so I left this out and it was still really good)
*2 tomatoes, chopped

Directions:
1. Heat oil in a medium saucepan over medium heat. Stir in onion and garlic, and saute untly slightly browned (~5min)
2. Mix quinoa into the saucepan and cover with vegetable broth. Season with cumin, cayenne, salt, and pepper
3. Bring the mixture to a boil. Cover, reduce heat, and simmer for 20 minutes.
4. Stir frozen corn into the saucepan, and continue to simmer for 5 minutes until heated through. Mix in the black beans, cilantro, and tomatoes. Enjoy!


We ate this as a meal itself, but it would also make a great filling for a burrito, tostado, or just with chips/pita chips! In fact, for left overs tomorrow I bought some whole wheat vegan tortillas to do exactly that! :)