Red Quinoa with Garlic & Thyme Roasted Cherry Tomatoes

Of course you could also use regular quinoa for this recipe if that’s what you have. Red wine vinegar would be lovely in place of the balsamic and a crumbling of feta cheese would be a perfect addition if you tolerate it—just scatter over the top with the basil leaves when you’re serving. Serves 2 as a main or 4-6 as a side.

Preheat oven to 200ºC/400ºF. Place cherry tomatoes into an oven-proof dish, scatter with thyme, pour over olive oil and vinegar, add capers and garlic, season well with salt and pepper and bake for 10–15 minutes until the skins of the tomatoes are begining to burst and the centres are lovely and soft. Remove from the oven and serve large spoonfuls of roasted cherry tomatoes over warm or room temperature red quinoa. Make sure you spoon over some of the lovely, flavoursome cooking juices too. Scatter a handful of fresh basil leaves over the top and serve.

Note: To cook quinoa; put 1 cup of water on to boil, rinse 1/2 cup quinoa well (to remove the saponin, a bitter protective coating) and drain. The easiest way to do this is to put the raw grain into a fine mesh sieve and rinse under running water, then set aside to drain while the water is coming up to the boil. When your water is boiling, add the rinsed quinoa, cover and turn down to a gentle simmer and cook for 10–12 minutes until the grains become translucent and an unusual outer white ring shows. Remove from the heat and fluff up with a fork. 1/2 cup raw= 2 cups cooked quinoa.