Quinoa Zucchini Casserole

Since hubby’s been on this exercise he gets home a lot later at night, while I miss having our “us time” in the evenings it has given me a little more time for trying new recipes. Last night I saw a recipe on Pinterest for a broccoli quinoa casserole which said it was “only 200 Cal a serving” which… first of all you should be eating more than that for a meal but, more importantly, it had mayonnaise and cream soup as two of the main ingredients. Not exactly the healthy and clean recipe I was looking for. However, I decided I wanted to try to make a healthy quinoa casserole and if it didn’t work I had back up quick meals waiting in the fridge. It was delicious! I’m sure if I Googled it I would find that I’m not at all creative but this was one of the first times in a while that I completely came up with a recipe so I was proud of myself 😀

You’ll need:

• 1.25 C cooked quinoa (to cook it, boil water, add in quinoa, reduce heat and cover, simmer for 12-20 min)
• 2 medium zucchinis diced
• olive oil
• 6 oz plain organic yogurt
• 2 tbsp lemon juice
• Approx. 1 cup marinara sauce (I make mine from scratch so it had chunks of tomato in it)
• Black Pepper to taste
• 2 cloves Garlic (minced or just use garlic powder)
• 1/2 C Grated Parmesan Cheese

1. Preheat oven to 350
2. In a sauce pan LIGHTLY coat the zucchini with olive oil, cook over medium heat with pepper and garlic to taste until zucchini softens
3. In a mixing bowl, combine cooked zucchini, cooked quinoa, yogurt, lemon juice, and marinara sauce
4. Spray a 9 x 9 baking dish with canola oil and add the quinoa mixture
5. Top with Parmesan cheese to taste (I’m guessing on the 1/2 C I just used enough to cover the top)
6. Bake for 30-40 min, until the edges start to brown

 

 

Today I worked out with my trainer again and killed my lats and biceps. Been working cardio back in and it’s made a world of difference in my energy levels. I just feel a whole lot better physically and about myself when I’m getting cardio into my workouts. Gotta get back into the routine of it but I’m getting there.