Sausage Supper/Crazy for Quinoa

My dad is back in the hospital tonight. Yesterday there was a 911 call, an ambulance, and another surgery. Pretty scary, but he’s okay now and should be back at home tomorrow. Chase and I spent Saturday evening with him and he seemed to be in good spirits. My mom and my brother have been with him today, so I stayed home and kept myself busy in the kitchen. Here’s everything I made for Sunday dinner with Chase.

After seeing all the posts raving about Julie’s Sausages, I just had to give them a try. They were so easy to make and turned out great.



I decided to pair them with peppers and onions. Chase put his on a little French bread loaf we found at our Asian market. I checked to be sure it was vegan. The ingredients were wheat flour, yeast, water – perfect.

I had to have a taste of the sausage. It is fantastic! They are seasoned perfectly and the texture is just right. Chase was so happy to have leftovers to take home and put in his spinach wraps for lunches next week.

I also made Lima Bean Green Chili Dip, courtesy of LK Sisters. (I felt compelled to make a dip on Super Bowl Sunday.) I spiced their recipe up just a little with red pepper flakes and garlic, but I usually put those two ingredients in everything. It’s a beautiful green color, a bit spicy, and absolutely delicious. Thanks for the recipe, LK!

I bought these 2 bags of chips for the dip. You all probably eat these all the time, but I never really snack on chips so they seem new to me. Chase liked both of these, and I especially liked the rice chips.

Sweet Potato Salad with broccoli, green beans, carrots, and green onions, and a ranch style dressing. A new way with broccoli, cold and creamy good. Chase went nuts over this. He had been missing an old fashioned, “mayo” type potato salad.

Quinoa dish 1 – Red Rice, Lentil, and Quinoa Pilaf with leeks and carrots. When my dad bought me some black rice awhile back, he also bought me some red rice. This was my first time to make it, and combining it with lentils and quinoa was tasty as well as a nice contrast in textures. Adding in the leeks and carrots made it very pretty too.

So here is our table….

.... and here is Chase’s plate of too much food!

Chase has no desire for sweets lately, so I made a fruit salad for dessert – fresh apples, nectarines, grapes, oranges, and blueberries.

Quinoa dish 2 – Quinoa Granola to top our fruit with. I couldn’t really taste quinoa, but it’s really good granola and if you would like to make it, you know, for extra protein at breakfast, simply mix together 2 cups quinoa, 4 cups rolled oats, ½ cup almonds, and ½ cup pistachios. Then mix together ½ cup maple syrup, ½ cup canola oil, 1 T. cinnamon, 1 T. vanilla, and a pinch of salt. Mix the wet and dry ingredients, spread on a baking sheet, and bake at 350 for about 30 minutes, stirring every 7 or 8 minutes. When cool, mix in your add-ins. I added craisins and dried blueberries.

For some reason I’ve been craving dried blueberries. So they are also in Quinoa dish 3 – Quinoa Breakfast Bars. These are made with quinoa flakes and turned out really nice.

I have the “big game” on, but I’m not really watching it. I am slowly but surely making my way around to all your blogs, and I apologize for falling behind on comments. Hopefully this week will be back to normal so I can catch up.