By Jennifer Birch, guest blogger for fbfc
The best way to get the most out of your meals is to prepare simple, delicious recipes like those featured in our list of “Five Ingredient High Five” series. You can get even more out of your meals by choosing to cook with vitamin-rich, nutrient-packed ingredients like grains. These are composed of cereal, such as wheat, rice, oats, and corn. How Stuff Works talks of health benefits of grains, such as lowering the risk of heart disease, cancer, and diabetes.
Cooking grains can seem intimidating at first, as people often have the misconception that there’s more to them than just putting them in a regular old pot and letting them cook. Luckily, there have been many tried-and-tested ways to cook grains using regular kitchen appliances, and besides that, the best Cuckoo rice cookers are now even equipped with specialized settings for the type of grains you want to cook. Adding grains into your diet can be simple, easy, and extremely rewarding, especially in these cold winter months. Here are two recipes you can try (and to help lessen the hassle of finding ingredients, we’ve marked those you can get from us with an asterisk [*] ):
Instant Pot Chipotle Chicken Bowl
This is a dish you can prepare ahead of time and just pack in the fridge until you’re ready for it. The most important appliance to be used here is a pressure cooker, and Healthy Kitchen 101’s review of pressure cookers says that the best ones can give you the greatest possible amount of nutrients by shortening cooking time. This is especially helpful for busy people since they can get meals done quickly but without sacrificing nutrition.
INGREDIENTS
For The Chicken
1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
*1/2 teaspoon ground cumin
1 tablespoon chipotle paste
*1 cup prepared mild salsa
1 pound boneless, skinless chicken thighs
2 ears of corn
*black pepper
For The Quinoa
1/4 teaspoon kosher salt
*3/4 cup uncooked quinoa, rinsed and drained
*1/2 tablespoon olive oil
1 cup plus 2 tablespoons water
*1 lime, juiced
*2 tablespoons chopped cilantro
For the Bowls
*1 cup halved cherry tomatoes
*2 tablespoons chopped cilantro
*1 small avocado, sliced (4 oz)
*4 lime wedges
DIRECTIONS
- Combine salt, cumin black pepper, chipotle, and salsa in a bowl.
- Place the chicken and pour salsa in the pressure cooker. Cook on high pressure for 20 minutes. Then add the corn and cook at high pressure for 2 minutes.
- Cook the quinoa, water, and salt in a saucepan over high heat until it boils. Then put the heat to low and cover the pot. Cook until all the liquid is absorbed. Fluff with a fork before removing from heat. Put in the lime juice, olive oil, and cilantro and stir.
- When chicken is cooked, place in a bowl and shred, then add 1/2 cup of the sauce. Cut the corn off the husk.
- Per bowl, put 2/3 cup quinoa,1/2 cup shredded chicken with more sauce, 1/3 cup corn, 1/4 cup tomatoes, and 1 ounce avocado. Top with some cilantro and serve with a couple of lime wedges.
Easy Vegan Teriyaki Rice Bowl
Teriyaki might look like a complicated dish to make, but this recipe makes it customizable depending on what vegetables you have available. This dish mainly uses an oven and stove. Digital Trends’ oven ranges list describes how oven ranges modernize the kitchen, as some of them are smart ovens or have built-in air fryers. An oven range is essentially an all-in-one stove with an oven, so you can get more things done at once without leaving your place.
INGREDIENTS
*2 baby bok choy
*2 green onions, sliced
*2 tablespoons sesame oil or veggie broth
*4 cups cooked brown rice
*16 broccolini stalks
*20 cremini mushrooms
Vegan Teriyaki Sauce
DIRECTIONS
- Preheat oven to 425°F.
- Wash and chop vegetables then mix in a bowl with sesame oil. You can choose to add salt or pepper if you want.
- Spread vegetables on a parchment lined cookie sheet and roast until it is at the doneness you prefer, usually after 15 minutes.
- While the vegetables are cooking, make rice and sauce. Slice green onions.
- In each bowl, put rice and vegetables, drizzle with teriyaki sauce and sprinkle with green onion slices.
Because they can go with just about anything, cooking with grains makes a meal more easily customizable! Hopefully after trying these recipes, you become more confident in your ability to make other meals with grains.
Prepared by: Jessie Blanner
For: frenchbroadfood.coop
Image Credit: Unsplash