Welcome Back to YouRoots! We are very excited to share with you a few different protein packed recipes to ensure you are getting enough on this plant based lifestyle. Hopefully it will help you drum of a few different ideas, the cheese sauce is very versatile and can be used with brown rice pasta as well! For more pointers on protein, how much you need and some other protein packed foods, watch the video below!
This dish was Western inspired with keeping one thing in mind, protein! Today we will be cooking a Quinoa Mac & Cheese with some greens and minty fresh peas. We are going to prepare a super easy to make Chickpea snack that you can use as an appetizer or garnish. To wash it all down, we will be doing an easy to make Supercharged Nut, Soya & Chocolate Protein shake. I’ve personally made this for my family and they loved it! It’s great comfort food for the kids as well.
Ingredients
Quinoa Mac & Cheese with Minty Peas:
- 1 cup of quinoa
- 2 cups of water with one tbsp of salt
- 1 cup of frozen peas
- Pinch of mint
- Cheese Sauce:
- ½ cup of soaked cashews
- ½ cup Lima beans
- 1½ cup of soya milk (unsweetened)
- 1 tsp of paprika
- 3 tbsp of nutritional yeast
- 1 tsp salt
- 1 tsp pepper
- 1 clove of garlic.
Roasted Lemon & Chili Chickpeas:
- 2 cups of cooked chickpeas
- 1 tsp olive oil
- 1 tsp salt
- 1 tsp pepper
- ½ tsp chili powder (more or less depending on the spice level you want!)
- 1 tbsp of lemon zests.
Supercharged Nut & Soya & Chocolate Protein Shake
- ½ cup plant based protein powder
- ¼ cup hemp seeds
- ¼ pumpkin seeds
- ¼ non hulled sesame seeds
- 1 banana
- 2½ cups soya milk
You will first want to get your Roasted Lemon & Chili Chickpeas going so it can be enjoyed while you are cooking or shortly after. This one is EASY, especially for how amazing it tastes, it’s packed full of protein as well. All you do is mix all ingredients together in a bowl and put on a baking sheet in the oven @ 185C for 25 min.
Ready To Serve! It’s as easy as that. If you want it more crispy, leave it in the oven for longer. Enjoy!
Time to get the Quinoa going for the “Mac & Cheese”. Take one cup of quinoa and two cups of water. Bring to a boil and simmer for 10 – 15 minutes. Once you have about a few minutes left, get your cheese sauce ready! Again, super simple, take all of the ingredients, put them into a blender and that’s it. Take a taste to ensure everything is good!
Mix the cooked quinoa with the cheese sauce (make sure you mix it as much as you can), add ½ punch of chopped parsley put the mixture into a casserole dish. Top it off with Japanese breadcrumbs and bake for 35 min @ 185C.
Now lets get our peas going, take some olive oil and heat up the pan. Once heated add in the peas, cook for 5 – 10 minutes. Once cooked, add in a bit of mint, salt and pepper to taste. It’s as easy as that and a great garnish to impress! With our plating, we added some arugula for some extra flavor and nutrition.
This dish will be sure to impress your friends and family. Heck even yourself once you are done! Put some love into the plating as well and get a bit creative. We added in some red peppers to really make everything pop in terms of presentation. The better a dish looks, generally the better it will taste!
To wash everything down, let’s get our Supercharged Nut & Soya & Chocolate Protein Shake going! Simple, take all ingredients and put into a blender, serve and enjoy. This is something you can enjoy at anytime during the day or in the morning after your workout! It’s an easy way to get enough protein. We personally use Vega as it’s also packed with a lot of vitamins and nutrients. It’s also plant-based with no whey!
Thanks again for taking time out of your day and we really hope that you are finding value out of our blog posts and a few laughs from our videos. Stay tuned for another weekly blog post with another great recipe.
If you have any feedback or comments, good or bad, please let us know below, we welcome all feedback as we are always looking to improve. From the both of us remember to be positive, live with purpose and eat nutritious and delicious wholesome plant based foods!
