Quinoa failure!

I've been trying to work with Quinoa (pronounced "keen-wha").  My first dish, which was a take on mushroom risotto, turned out well.  Quinoa has the unique property that the outside stays crunchy while the inside softens.  That gave it a delightful "pop" when first chewed, almost like a good caviar.  It's incredibly healthy, and I've been looking to broaden the grains I eat.  So, I set out to make more.

I tried a breakfast dish, based on Southern Cheese Grits.  I love cheese grits, even if they're not the healthiest breakfast.  I always use whole-grain, coarse-grind corn meal.  That makes it healthier, but really I choose that style because it tastes best.  I can't imagine how Aunt Jemima convinced the whole southern United States that removing the germ benefits the consumer at all.  It's all about shelf-life, damn taste and nutrition. 

Quinoa doesn't have this problem.  It's all about healthiness, damn the taste and shelf-life.  Consequently, it has a raw flavor to it.  To combat this, I used a technique that I developed with corn-meal.  Toast the grain in a little bit of butter before cooking.  Aside from that, I used the standard recipe.

Unfortunately, it doesn't work with Quinoa.  Quinoa doesn't have a lot of starch.  It's mostly protein.  So, it didn't thicken right, and the fat from the butter coated the kernels and prevented them from absorbing water.  The dish took forever to cook and had a weird taste.  Normally, cheese works really well with grits because the starch from the corn mixes with the cheese to allow it to blend with the liquid.  But, since quinoa is so high in protein, there wasn't enough starch to allow this to happen.  The cheese clumped. 

Eww!