Mexican Quinoa Wraps

It's meatless Monday!  I'm going to be honest - the presentation of a meatless meal to my family goes over like a lead balloon.  No kidding - There is some SERIOUS resistance to vegetable based dinners in this house.  I hear things like "Isn't there any meat in this?" and "did you FORGET to add the meat?" 

Despite the resistance that I get to my meat-free meals, I continue to try and incorporate them into our meal plan.  Thanks to my 8 years of personal chef experiences - I'm way beyond the point of getting discouraged by negative feedback to my food.  (Too bad for them.) 

I had high hopes that this Mexican Quinoa Burrito would help change the minds of my vegetarian phobic (Is that a thing?) family members.  I will keep you in suspense about their opinions of this new meatless creation until the end of the post and let you guess how they reacted. 

Mexican Quinoa Wraps

• 1 tablespoon olive oil
• 2 cloves garlic, minced
• 1 jalapeno, ribs removed and diced small
• 1 cup well-rinsed quinoa
• 1 1/4 cups chicken broth
• 1 (15-ounce) can black beans, drained and rinsed
• 1 14.5-ounce can of fire roasted diced tomatoes or regular diced tomatoes
• 1 medium zucchini (approx 1 cup), diced
• 1 medium red bell pepper, diced
• 1 1/2 teaspoons chili powder
• 1/2 teaspoon ground cumin
• 1/2 teaspoon fine Kosher salt
• 1/2 teaspoon crushed red pepper flakes
• 1 avocado, halved, seeded, peeled and diced
• 2 tablespoons fresh lime juice – from one lime
• 1/4 cup chopped fresh cilantro leaves
  

Chop garlic and jalapeno.   Saute in oil until softened. 

Add quinoa, beans, tomatoes, zucchini, bell pepper, spices and broth to pan.

Stir to combine.

Bring to a boil.  Reduce heat to simmer, cover and cook 20 minutes. 

Stir in lime, cilantro and avocado.

Serve in bowls as one option.

OR ... wrap in spinach wraps. 

So the taste tasters (aka - my family) reacted to this meal with widely varying opinions.  Ben and I thought is was delicious - like we ate it two meals in a row delicious.  Courtney on the other hand could not grasp the point of a meatless burrito.  She spent about 10 minutes very strategically dissecting her burrito and asked me to identify every vegetable that she extracted from it.  I'm fairly certain that she managed to get remove all of the vegetables and eat only the quinoa. 

What can I say?  My girl will always be a carnivore.  But that doesn't mean I will give up on my quest to find a meatless meal that she will love.  I'm way to stubborn to give up that easily.  Let me know if you've got a good meatless recipe that I can try.  I'd love to hear your ideas. 

Ciao!

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