Beef and Quinoa Stew

Quinoa.  It's an ancient Peruvian grain that has (semi-)recently become a bigger deal in the rest of the world for being a complete protein and also for being an alternative to the grains we're more familiar with.  Somehow, every foodblog thinks that the only people who read them are people who have never heard of it, though, and they have to tell you how to say it and get all "try it, you'll like it!"  Since most people who read foodblogs are other foodbloggers, that's kind of a dumb assumption to make.  I'm not really sure who the main audience of MassBytes is, but I feel like quinoa has been poking its head up in enough places for enough time that everyone probably has at least heard of it. So I'll skip ahead to the recipe: Beef and Quinoa Stew.

for some reason this picture wants to upload rotated 90 degrees  clockwise, but it's just a pot of stew so I suppose it doesn't really matter... turn your head on the side to see it properly, if you don't mind looking a little ridiculous

This is a bit of a novel way of using quinoa, to me.  I'm used to seeing it in salads and light, summery-type dishes (expect a recipe for one of those in a couple weeks).  But in a beef stew, maybe you'd have potatoes, maybe lentils... why not quinoa?  The little "pearls" provide a peppy kind of counterpoint to the hunks of beef - you've got the heavy and the light combining together - and I suppose you could feel mighty virtuous about eating this stew, if that's your thing.

It's rainy and cold this week. Make some stew!