Pinteresting Things - Quinoa with Kale, Mushrooms, and Sweet Potatoes

If you've never even heard of Pinterest, then I'm quite sure you are walking around with your fingers in your ears and your eyes closed (maybe even saying "la la la la la"), but for those of you who have heard of it and don't really understand it, let me explain.  It rocks.  You can search for things on Pinterest - recipes, crafts, household tips, party ideas, photos of gorgeous places you may never see with your own eyes, and the list goes on and on and on.  You can "pin" something to one of your very own categorized boards (they had me at "categorized").  You can either create your own pin or re-pin something your friend pinned.  Or something a stranger pinned.  It's really all up to you.

Lately, despite my pinning euphoria, I've noticed some naysayers making negative, albeit funny and mostly true, statements about Pinterest and how we pinners will never make, do, or go to anything that we pin.  So to that I say phooey, mostly because pinning things gives me extreme happiness, but partly because I intend to make it my personal mission to blow that theory right out of the water.

I have already made a few of the recipes and crafts that I have found via Pinterest.  But now I feel I must step it up a notch and actively pursue doing the things I am pinning.  And document it all for posterity's sake.  And stick my tongue out at the naysayers. 

Quinoa with Kale, Mushrooms, and Sweet Potatoes was not the first recipe I made from Pinterest and it is actually one that I made a pin of my own darn self by pinning it from a blog called Fitness & Feta.  It was very easy to make, and for me that is important.  I tried this recipe because it sounded good.  I did NOT make this recipe for my family.  I don't think there's a single ingredient that any one of the four people I share this house with would have even touched.  I made it for myself and got four lunches out of it!

The final analysis is this:  It was a tasty meal for someone who is either vegetarian or trying to eat healthy.  In particular, someone who is both.  I am not a vegetarian, but I do try to do the healthy thing.  Sometimes.  This is not a meal that is going to be delicious to anyone who cares not for eating healthy.  You would obviously have to love all the ingredients, too.  I had never really tried kale and I conclude that I feel the same way about it as I do about spinach:  It should only be eaten raw.  Unless you are a fan of slimy and mushy.  I had also never tried quinoa.  As Randy Jackson would say from his American Idol judge's chair, "It was just alright for me."

Will I ever try this recipe again?  I'm not sure.  I'm leaning towards "no," but it's not impossible that I might get a craving for sweet potatoes, mushrooms, and garlic soaked with white wine.  Would it be okay to just eat sweet potatoes, mushrooms, and garlic drenched in wine?

Stay tuned because my next Pinteresting Thing is going to have to be something sweet and/or fun to balance out all this healthiness.  

P.S. Kale is a cruciferous vegetable.  And I think we all know what that means.