Cheesy Quinoa and Spinach Bake

A few years ago my husband made a tri-color quinoa dish that was so tasty. One layer was red (from sundried tomatoes), another layer was green (from pesto), and the final layer was light brown (from plain quinoa). It was a time consuming dish to layer all the ingredients but the final dish was so good.

It’s been a few years since we’ve had it so I thought we could make something with quinoa that was a little bit quicker to make. Something we could just throw in the oven when we get home from work. This Cheesy Quinoa and Spinach Bake was perfect for doing just that!

As I suspected my oldest son took one look at it and didn’t even want to try it. I had to convince him to take one bite, which he did, but his face turned up at it and he declared he wasn’t eating it. I don’t get it. Everything I put in it he likes (okay, maybe not the artichokes but I didn’t even tell him about those. Baby steps, people!) but he told me the quinoa reminded him of couscous. What? Couscous? Ya, because we eat so much couscous that he even knows what it is. Not!

Since he pushed his plate away our daughter decided she wasn’t eating it either! Because she has limited speech, all she kept saying was ‘yuck’, ‘blah’ as she stuck her tongue out in disgust. This was coming from a kid who eats anything – even my scraps of kale that she finds on the kitchen counter! Was it monkey see, monkey do? I don’t know but she clearly wasn’t having anything to do with this dish.

My middle son, however, kept telling me how good it was and that he loved the added artichokes. Hmmm, was he up to something? This is the son that could live off of Skittles and Starbursts his whole life!

In the end, two of my kids had bread and lunch meat for supper plus their leftover lunch snacks and the other kid (who apparently loved it) was my favorite child for the night! :)

Print Cheesy Quinoa and Spinach Bake

Prep Time: 30 minutes

Cook Time: 40 minutes

Total Time: 1 hour, 10 minutes

Yield: 6-8 servings

This dish is loaded with healthy, protein-packed quinoa, spinach, artichokes and Tex Mex cheese throughout.

Ingredients

1 Tbsp. olive oil
1 small onion, chopped
2 cloves of garlic, minced
1 pkg. frozen chopped spinach, thawed and water squeezed out
1 can of artichoke hearts, drained, rinsed and chopped
2 eggs
3/4 cup 3% plain yogurt (or Greek yogurt)
2 Tbsp. sour cream
1 3/4 cups Tex Mex shredded cheese (reserve 1/2 cup for the top)
3 cups cooked quinoa (about 1 cup dry)

Instructions

Preheat oven to 375 F. Lightly oil a 9X13 glass baking pan and set aside. In a large skillet or frying pan, add oil, onions and garlic. Saute until light brown. Add in spinach, artichoke hearts and couple dashes of salt and pepper. Saute for another 3-5 minutes, stirring frequently. Remove from heat and let cool. In a medium sized bowl, stir together eggs, yogurt, sour cream and 1 1/4 cups of cheese. Once spinach mixture is cooled, add yogurt/cheese mixture and quinoa to the pan and mix well. Pour mixture into the prepared baking dish and smooth down with the back of a spoon. Sprinkle remaining 1/2 cup cheese evenly over the top and bake for 35-40 minutes or until top is lightly golden brown (you can even broil the top for the last 2-3 minutes). Remove from oven and place on wire rack. Enjoy! Schema/Recipe SEO Data Markup by ZipList Recipe Plugin 2.2 http://asweetbaker.com/cheesy-quinoa-spinach-bake/

Recipe adapted from Kansas City Mamas

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