Right on b’ys!!  I did it!  I went and tried something new.  I did some research on healthy, but fun, recipes and found quinoa pizza bites.  I’ve always wanted an excuse to buy quinoa, and today I finally did!

This recipe is very, very basic and while it was good…I do plan on making some changes in the future.  I’ll explain more after I post the recipe.  Quick note, in case you’re wondering, Quinoa is pronounced KEEN-wah.

RECIPE FOR QUINOA PIZZA BITES

• 1/2 cup Quinoa
• 1 cup Water
• 1 egg (For a substitute, use 1 1/2 tbsp. of milled flax seed combined with 4 tbsp. of warm water)
• Pizza Sauce
• Cheese
• Pizza Toppings (if desired)

1)  Preheat oven to 350º.

2)  Boil water and add Quinoa.  After boiling for a couple of minutes, remove from heat, stir occasionally and allow quinoa to absorb the water.  This takes approximately 10-12 minutes.

3)  Once quinoa is ready and cooled slightly, add egg (or flax seed mixture) and mix with hands until quinoa is able to be formed into the pizza bites.

4)  In a greased muffin pan, fill each section 1/3 full with quinoa mixture.  Be careful not to overfill the sections as the bites will tend to taste bland.  Using a spoon, pack the mixture down gently and create a small dip in the middle of each bite.

5)  Bake the bites for 10 minutes.

6)  Remove the bites from the oven and add pizza sauce, toppings and cheese as desired.

7)  Bake again for 10-15 minutes.

8)  Remove from oven, cool and enjoy!

There you have it.  For my attempt, I used the flax seed mixture since (1) I didn’t have any eggs handy and (2) eggs used as a binding agent doesn’t really go over well with my family as most of us don’t like the taste of eggs.  In the original recipe, it simply said “bake for 20 minutes”, however I found it left the bites really crumbly and hard to manage.  Afterwards, I noticed that another recipe said to bake the bites before adding the toppings so that they end up more firm.

The next time I try this recipe, I plan on adding some flavor to the quinoa such as garlic, chili powder or oregano.  Quinoa is much like rice in that it takes on the flavors you add.  Quinoa itself is rather bland, that’s why I think adding some flavor will really make the bites tasty.

I hope you enjoy these!