A perfect balance between sweet chocolate and crunchy texture.
When we taste food, we feel 5 types of tastes; sweet, sour, salty, bitter and umami(also called savory).
However, whenever I eat, I have been obsessed with “a food texture” beside 5 basic types of tastes.
Since I started to enjoy feeling the food texture, I always cook pasta in “Al dente”, grill a fish with crispy skin and soft inside, grill a beef steak with juicy and tender texture, and cook shrimps for soft chewy texture.
I was looking for a crunchy healthy snack instead of chips with full of trans fat.
One day, while I was doing a grocery shopping in Whole Foods, I found a milk chocolate snack called Undercover Quinoa from Undercover Chocolate. It was crunchy and delicious. My husband who is a chocolate fan, especially loved it.
That is the reason why I decided to make my style of quinoa chocolate bar with nuts that I want.
(Note: Undercover Quinoa pops quinoa with pressure and high temperature so it tastes like a rice crispy texture. However, I do not have such machine so I popped it with frying pan. It will have harder texture than Undercover Quinoa. It still tastes amazing!)
It is a very easy recipe and all ingredient you need is
quinoa(I prefer pre-rinsed)
chocolate
nuts (whatever you like)
a baking tray
a baking sheet
a pot
& a stainless bowl.
I bought an organic whole grain quinoa from Bob’s Red Mill.
Usually, whenever I buy grain products like flour, oats, and popcorn, I enjoy getting Bob’s Red Mill’s products.
There are many options of organic grains and most of all, I appreciate Bob’s values that he wants to provide best quality foods to everyone.
There are three types of whole grain quinoa products from Bob’s Red Mill; organic quinoa grain, organic tricolor quinoa grain, and organic red quinoa grain. I always bought the general organic quinoa grain but I would like to buy other colors for fun next time.
You may choose any bitter or sweet chocolate depends on your taste.
I personally like very dark and bitter chocolate but because my husband has a sweet tooth, I mix 31% cacao milk chocolate baking chips and 60% cacao chocolate baking chips.
I chose pumpkin seeds and pecans for nuts!
I used walnuts for last time but I personally think that pumpkin seeds and pecans are better with chocolate.
First of all, pop the quinoa. Without any oil, fry quinoa in pan.
Although it is tempting to fry quinoa a lot at once, I recommend frying proper amount of quinoa with one thin layer on pan because it needs to fry evenly.
Fry until light yellow quinoa turn to golden brown.
When you fry quinoa, it will pop like popcorn but luckily, quinoa does not pop as high as popcorn so that you may not need a pan lid. The important tip is shaking the frying pan so that quinoa does not get burned!
Do this process multiple times until you get the amount of popped quinoa that you want. Place some popped quinoa in separate bowl for decoration.
Cut some pecans for smaller size and save some whole pecans for decoration.
Then, melt the chocolate with double boiling method.
Pour some water in the pot and then put stainless steel bowl on the pot.
If you want a thin layer of chocolate bar, melt one pack of 283g chocolate baking chips.
If you want a thick layer of chocolate bar, melt two packs of chocolate. (I used two packs).
Boil the water and melt the chocolate.
Once the chocolate is melted, put the popped quinoa, pumpkin seeds and crushed pecans. Mix it well.
Save some pumpkin seeds and whole pecans for decoration.
Put a baking sheet on a tray.
Pour the mixed chocolate on the tray evenly.
Decorate with popped quinoa, pumpkin seeds and whole pecans.
Place outside until it’s completely cooled.
Put it in the refrigerator for at least 6 hours.
Once it is hard, cut the chocolate with a desirable size.
Done!
A delicious harmony with quinoa, nuts, and bitter-sweet chocolate is a perfect snack with black coffee or fresh milk. I strongly recommend this recipe for crunchy snack lovers!
Quinoa is a super grain with tons of great nutritional value.
It contains more protein than wheat, barely, and beans. It also contains great amount of iron and potassium.
Many people who are in diet love quinoa because it is high in fiber. As a gluten-free pseudo cereal, quinoa is great for people who are intolerant or allergic to gluten.
However, even though people around the world love quinoa nowadays, it has a sad history.
Quinoa was cultivated in Andes surrounding Peru and Bolivia before around 7,000 years ago.
It is the second most important crop after corn for the ancient Inca Civilization.
Despite the Andean called quinoa, “The mother of grain”, Spanish colonists scorned quinoa as “food for Indians”, going as far as forcefully suppressing and forbidding its cultivation.
Later in the 1970s, a pair of Americans researched Inca Civilization and fell in love with quinoa. Soon, people all around the world love quinoa, ancient Inca's “The mother of grain”.
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