How to prep, cook, and season quinoa

Learn how to cook quinoa using an Instant pot or a stovetop pan with my simple recipe. You will also find how to season quinoa to make it more flavorful and use it for your breakfast, lunch, or dinner.

What is quinoa

Quinoa is a seed of the Chenopodium quinoa plant.

Technically it is not a grain and is often called a pseudo-grain because it is eaten as a grain (1). It is a gluten-free grain that has all nine essential amino acids (2). 

Though this is highly nutritious and has many health benefits (3), I like to include varied grains, pulses, and lentils in our diet for overall wellness.

How to cook quinoa

I usually cook quinoa using an Instant pot or rice cooker as it is a hands-free method. Before cooking, we need to prep the quinoa, and this step is common for all cooking methods.

Prepare Quinoa:

• Wash the quinoa couple of times by rubbing it with your hands to remove the outer coat of quinoa call saponins. If you do not wash them properly, there might be a slight bitterness in quinoa.
• Drain the water from the quinoa entirely and keep it aside.

How to cook quinoa in an Instant Pot

• Coat the Instant pot inner pot with a teaspoon of oil. Though this step is optional, this will prevent the quinoa from sticking to the pot.

• Add drained quinoa, water, and salt (Use salt only if you plan to use quinoa for making savory recipes)

• Close the instant pot with its lid, seal the vent.
• Select manual or pressure cook mode cook it on HIGH PRESSURE for 1 minute.

• Once the Instant pot beeps, wait for 10 minutes and do a pressure release.

• Fluff it up with a fork, and the instant pot quinoa is ready.

Stovetop instructions:

• Heat a cooking pot. Add the drained quinoa, water to the cooking pot, and close it partially with the lid. 
• Increase the heat to high and let the water come to the boiling, around 5 minutes.
• Now reduce the flame to low and close it with the lid completely.
• Let the quinoa cook until all the water is absorbed. It will take anywhere from 5 to 10 minutes. It might take more if you are cooking a large quantity of quinoa.
• Please switch off the flame and let it sit for ten more minutes.
• Fluff it up with a fork, and the cooked quinoa is ready to use.

Tips to get fluffy quinoa:

• Add a teaspoon of oil along with water while cooking it.
• It's tempting to stir it often, but avoid it as stirring will break the grains and make them lumpy.
• Fluff it up with a fork after 10 minutes of cooking and let it cool down before using it.

Seasoning the Quinoa

A lot of people(count me in!) find quinoa as bland. So seasoning will enhance the flavor.

You can season the quinoa in two ways. While the first one is to add seasoning agents while cooking the quinoa, the other method is to season the cooked quinoa.

What can I add to quinoa while cooking?

If you plan to use cooked quinoa for any savory recipes, season it using any of these variations. Add any one of these seasoning agents while cooking quinoa.

• Butter or coconut oil - yes, simple butter or oil will make it fluffy and mildly sweet.
• Salt - When you want to use quinoa for savory dishes, add salt while cooking it. In this way, salt will be absorbed by the quinoa evenly and will be tasty.
• Dried herbs like thyme, oregano, basil, mint - Chose your dried herbs depending on the recipe you would like to make with quinoa. For Italian flavors, thyme or oregano or mixed herbs d province will be good. For Indian recipes, mint or cilantro is a good addition.
• Garlic powder (¼ teaspoon for 1 cup of raw quinoa)
• Ginger powder (¼ teaspoon for 1 cup of raw quinoa)
• Turmeric powder and cumin powder (¼ teaspoon each for 1 cup of raw quinoa). You can use only cumin powder as well.
• Vegetable broth - Use vegetable broth instead of water for cooking quinoa.
• Bay leaf - add a bay leaf while cooking quinoa.
• Coconut milk - use thin coconut milk for cooking quinoa. That nutty coconut taste will enhance the quinoa. You can use this quinoa cooked in coconut milk for sweet recipes as well.

If you want to use cooked quinoa for sweet recipes like porridge, you can cook it in coconut milk and add whole spices like cinnamon, cardamom, or saffron.

Vanilla bean syrup or grated nutmeg will be a good option if you are flavoring cooked quinoa for breakfast porridge.

Other variations to season quinoa:

Sometimes we forget to season the quinoa while cooking it. In that case, you can season the already cooked quinoa as well. Simple herbs and spices will make the quinoa taste so much better.

• Pesto - This is my favorite way to flavor quinoa. Mix ¼ cup of pesto with 3 cups of quinoa, and your pesto flavored quinoa is ready. You can add even more pesto!
• Coriander - Mix the cooked quinoa with finely chopped coriander leaves (you can use thin stems also). A dash of lemon is a good addition too.
• Mint leaves - finely chop fresh mint leaves and mix them with cooked quinoa. 
• Depending on how you would like to use cooked quinoa, you can mix up spice powders like cajun seasoning, Mexican seasoning, curry powder, etc., with the cooked quinoa. Add a teaspoon of oil so that spice powders get distributed evenly.

how to store cooked quinoa

• You can store cooked quinoa in the refrigerator for 3 to 4 days. Store it in the freezer if you want to use it for more days.
• It is always good to store it in small containers based on your portion sizes for a day. Take out only the required amount and reheat it or use it in your recipes.
• As it doesn't take much time to cook, I prefer cooking it fresh every time.

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Recipe:

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