In my endless quest to discover grains or pseudo grains (grains are the babies of plants from the grass family, pseudo grains are babies that are like grains, but are the babies of plants that are not from the grass family) that do not set off my food intolerances, I decided yesterday to have give buckwheat another crack at me.
Now buckwheat is a pseudo grain, so it is not the seed of a grass, hmmm, I seem to be narrowing in on something here with my intolerances, it is actually related to sorrel and rhubarb, both of which I eat in vast quantities, so fingers crossed that I may be able to eat this. I did try it years ago, but at that time my body was so inflamed that I was discarding the babies with the bath water and put it onto my ‘avoid’ list.
Last night I cooked up a small batch and had it mixed in with a smoked salmon and avocado salad. It was very nice, especially as I made the last of the pesto into a slurry and used it as a salad dressing. I thought that I might try mixing it with quinoa and seeing if I could make a porridge that is closer to the rolled oat porridge that I love, but can no longer eat.
Looks pretty good, doesn’t it? This was one tablespoon of buckwheat and one tablespoon of quinoa mixed together and simmered for half an hour, make very sure that everything is cooked, we are checking for translucence and for the quinoa to make ’worms’, remember? Drain off any water that has not been absorbed and then let it sit for a minute before popping into a bowl. Now, if you have been following this blog, you know that this is usually the cue for me to fill this with fresh fruit and nuts or seeds, but not today. Today I am feeling nostalgic and trying to recreate one of my favourites of yesteryear, oat porridge with brown sugar and full cream cow’s milk.
Buckwheat and Quinoa Porridge with maple syrup and almond milk. Well, it doesn’t set into a lumpy oat brick like traditional oat porridge does, but other than that, I am pretty pleased with this.