Smoked Sausage Quinoa Bake
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This recipe is an interesting twist, combining the flavors of smoked sausage and cheese with the health and nutrition of quinoa. If you're looking for something different, here you go. Just don't settle on the smoked sausage. I made this recipe with turkey smoked sausage, and it was just OK. You really need to use the real thing to make this recipe work its magic.
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Ingredients
1 cup cooked quinoa
6-7 oz smoked sausage, diced and cooked 1/2 cup green bell pepper, diced 1/4 onion, diced 1/2 tsp minced garlic 1/4 tsp garlic salt 1 cup apple, peeled and diced 7 oz diced tomatoes 1/4 cup whole milk 3 cups shredded cheddar cheese |
Prep Time: 45 minutes
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[Note: You can substitute the green bell pepper with red, yellow, or orange pepper, the onion with 2 tsp onion powder, and the garlic with 1 tsp garlic powder. Also, most smoked sausages come packaged in 13 oz sizes; this recipe calls for about half of that to cut back on calories and fat. Feel free to use the entire 13 oz if desired.]
Directions
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Dice the smoked sausage and pepper.
I didn't have any green bell pepper when I made this, so I used what I had, which was orange. The apple is not shown, but if you have an apple corer, that makes prepping the apple way easier. You could leave the peel on if you like, but I chose to remove it since the textures of the resulting dish would be so different as to be way too distracting. |
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Add sausage and pepper to heated pan.
Notice my use of a wok. This is a great option for making this recipe because the wok allows for even heating, I can stir the ingredients with less worry about something leaving my pan, and the handles on the side come in handy when placing the final cooked mixture into a casserole dish. I can do it while the food is still warm, so there's no need to wait for anything to cool. |
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Add onion, garlic, and diced apple to mixture and cook together until meat is thoroughly cooked.
You want to cook the meat a little with the pepper first before adding the other ingredients. This method allows more of the pepper flavor to soak into the meat. If you add in the seasonings at the same time as the pepper, the onion and especially the garlic flavors will block some of the pepper flavor from entering the meat, and you won't get the same blend of flavor in the end result. The apple is also added last so that it can retain its sweetness and not be diluted by the pepper. |
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Pour mixture into casserole dish and add milk, tomatoes, 1 cup cheddar cheese. Stir to combine.
A portion of the cheese is added into the mix to serve as a binder for the rest of the mixture. Ideally the milk helps to extend the binder by combining with the cheese as it melts, but to maximize this effect, you need to have the cheese beginning to melt before you add the quinoa. You can try to achieve this by returning to your heat source and heating the mixture on low heat or (on an older model stove) placing the casserole dish over a burner while the oven in heating. Careful, though! The dish will get hot, so be careful when lifting it to place it in the oven. |
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Add quinoa, and mix well.
Just 1 cup of cooked quinoa may not seem like a lot, but once you mix this with the other ingredients you will see that it is plenty foe the entire dish. |
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Even mixture inside dish and top with remaining cheddar cheese.
Feel free to experiment with different kinds of cheeses. My preference is for sharp cheddar cheese becaus eit best complements the other flavors in the dish, especially the meat. |
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Bake at 400ºF for 15 minutes. Allow to cool for a few minutes and then serve warm.
Serve this with some vegetables on the side, and you have a wonderful, nicely balanced meal. This recipe will make 6 larger size servings or 8 smaller size servings. |
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