Quinoa Stuffed Avocados

I spent last weekend in NYC and Nicole joined me for part of the visit. Naturally we spent half our time talking about food, and much of it was about quinoa, avocados, and coconut. Yep, we’re that cool, chatting about complete proteins and heart-healthy fats. All that chit-chat about quinoa and avocados inspired me to make a fun and fast dinner of quinoa stuffed avocados, similar to a VegNews recipe I saw recently, and the concept of double stuffed baked potatoes.

Ingredients:

• 1.5 cups cooked red quinoa (I had cooked a big batch of quinoa in the rice cooker over the weekend and it came out perfectly! I used cold quinoa for this.)
• 2 avocados, diced
• 2 medium tomatoes, diced
• 2 Tbsp lemon juice
• 2 Tbsp olive oil
• salt and pepper to taste

Source: Flickr

Cut avocados in half, remove the pit, and then cut avocado into a checkerboard pattern.  Then scoop the pieces out with a spoon leaving the avocado skin halves in-tact and save these for later. (Sorry for the blurry photo!)

In a bowl, combine cooked (and cooled) quinoa, avocado, diced tomatoes, lemon juice, olive oil, salt and pepper.

Scoop quinoa filling into avocado skins (it’s about 1/3 cup scoop each) and enjoy! The presentation for this dish is the fanciest part. The ingredients are insanely simple but together taste great: nutty quinoa, creamy avocado, and juicy tomatoes. What more would you want?! I still have half of the “stuffing” left over which we’ll probably enjoy over a bed of greens tonight. Let me know if you make this. I think it’d be a fun party food too – everyone could waltz around holding their little avocado cups raving about what an amazing chef you are!