Quinoa Kale Cakes

Quinoa Kale Cakes, say that three times fast! Growing up my best friend was Polish. Her mom was thick accent, moved from the motherland only a few yeas ago Polish. She was a stern but wonderful woman that was always trying to feed me. Always. She made these delicious morsels called potato pancakes I adore. She made them for me sometimes when I wasn't getting her daughter into trouble. Hehe. I have never been able to perfect the potato pancake quite like her, but I like to think these quinoa cakes are a healthier version that do hers a tiny bit of justice. 

These cakes are not very stable or hold together until they are cooking ( a lot like potato pancakes), but once the cheese crisps up and the eggs cook they firm up a bit. So do not fret!

Ingredients:

  • 2 cups of cooked quinoa (I like to precook more then this and additional quinoa can be used in salads for lunch throughout the week.)
  • 1 cup egg whites OR 3 large eggs. 
  • 1 cup fine chopped kale. Removing the hard stem first.
  • 1.5 cups cheese. I used Mozzarella, but I've also used Parmesan or Cheddar.  
  • 1 tsp garlic powder
  • salt and pepper to taste

Remove the hard stems from the kale. 

How to:

  1. Preheat eh pan to a medium high heat.
  2. Mix all the ingredients in a bowl really well. 
  3. Scoop up about 2 tbsp of mixture and place in the pan, spreading it out a bit. 
  4. Flip when the edges start to brown a bit.
  5. Press down to cook the other side flattening and remove from heat when done. 
  6. Enjoy alone or I like Thai chili sauce or any condiment to you hearts desire!

 

Serve as a side dish or eat on their own!

What's In The Fridge Stuffed Peppers

I love recipes that allow me to throw whatever is in the fridge into a meal, especially if it can be healthy. As we all do I believe. So loosely take what I have for ingredients and use whatever you'd like. 

What you need for this recipe:

  • 3 bell peppers (more or less depending on the amount of people you have.
  • 1 cup of precooked rice. This is great to do if you have leftover rice from the day before or food prepping. I used leftover brown rice.
  • half an onion
  • 2 tbsp garlic
  • Olive oil
  • 1 cup of kale/spinach
  • 1 cup of kidney beans. Other options could be cooked ground beef or chicken or any other bean you have on hand. 
  • 1 cup of cheese of choice. We used marble, but mozzarella or goat cheese would be fabulous. 
  • salt and pepper and/or any other seasonings you love. 

Directions:

  1. Preheat he oven to 400 degrees. 
  2. Heat oil in the pan and add the onions and beans until tender. Or you can add your meat of choice until cooked.
  3. Add the garlic and the greens until wilted.
  4. Add the rice to warm it up, if it's been cold in the fridge from leftovers.
  5. Cut the peppers in half and scoop out the seeds.
  6. Add cooked mixture to the inside of each half.
  7. Top with cheese.
  8. Put the peppers on a cookie sheet and pop in the oven until the cheese is melted and the peppers are soft. I like to put on broil the last minute to get the cheese to bubble. 
  9. Enjoy!

What's in the fridge that you will put in yours?

 

Love, 

Jen