Recipe: Quinoa and Lentil Soup

From the Vitality Food Feature ‘QUINOA CUISINE‘.

This rib-sticking recipe is a real quickie to prepare! (Makes a tureen full of soup)

Ingredients

• 2 Tbsp olive oil
• 1 onion, minced
• 1/2 stick celery, diced
• 2 carrots, chopped
• 4 cloves garlic, minced until soft
• 1/2 tsp ground cumin
• 1 tsp ground coriander
• sea salt and pepper to taste
• 2 cups small lentils (red, white or other), washed
• 1 cup raw (uncooked) black or red quinoa
• 8 cups water
• basil to garnish, minced

1) Heat olive oil in soup pot, and sauté onion, celery, carrots, and minced garlic until soft.

2) Add cumin, coriander, sea salt and pepper to taste. Cook until absorbed.

3) Add lentils, raw (uncooked) quinoa, and water. Bring to boil, reduce heat, and simmer covered for 15 minutes, or until lentils are tender.

4) Garnish with minced basil upon serving.

5) (Variation: if you have leftover cooked quinoa in the fridge, you can use it in place of raw quinoa, in which case you can reduce the water to 6 cups and simply stir the cooked quinoa into the soup when the lentils are tender and heat through)