I have been having a Wonder Years marathon. Its pretty awesome. Did you know netflix now has all the seasons on instant? Did you know that Winnie Cooper grew up to be some brilliant math person who tweets palindromes? Did you know that Travis from Clueless (Breckin Myer) pretty much plays the same exact character on the early episodes of The Wonder Years also? Its weird. I love that show.
Anyway, on the blog we have been posting a lot of Thanksgiving and party food recipes to gear up for December. Parties are fun. It’s a bit stressful to figure out what to bring sometimes. I just happen to have some thoughts on what to bring to holiday parties. Our Bacon Jam. is always a hit. It’s easy to use as a dip, or a spread on a cheese board, or on a crostini. Chocolate Covered Potato Chip are also always a big hit!
These cheesy quinoa cakes are delicious, and they keep really well. You can make them ahead and serve them warm, or just serve them room temp. I love simple, but they are really good with just a little aoili.
♥ Teri
Some other appetizer recipes you might like that are similar:
Cheesy Quinoa Cakes with a Roasted Garlic and Lemon Aioli
INGREDIENTS
- 2 cups cooked quinoa
- ⅔ cup grated fontina cheese
- 3 tablespoons all purpose flour
- 2 green onions, thinly sliced
- 1 egg, lightly beaten
- 2 teaspoons freshly ground black pepper
- 2 ½ tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
- salt to taste
aioli
- ½ cup light mayonnaise
- 1 head of garlic, roasted
- 1 lemon, zested and juiced
- ¼ teaspoon cayenne pepper
- salt and pepper to taste
INSTRUCTIONS
- For the cakes: Place all ingredients, except for the oil, into a mixing bowl and stir together until well combined. Season with salt and allow the mixture to sit for 5 minutes.
- Pour oil into a large sauté pan and place over medium heat.
- Form ¼ cup patties with the quinoa mixture and place in the heated sauté pan. (this will have to be done in batches)
- Cook quinoa cakes for about 5 minutes on each side. Repeat with the remaining patties until all of the cakes have been cooked. Set aside.
- For the aioli: Place all ingredients into a food processor, season with salt and pepper and blend until smooth. Pour into a small bowl and serve alongside the warm quinoa cakes.
NOTES
- *Makes 10 to 12 Quinoa Cakes
Did you make this recipe? We want to see!
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Made these tonight. Hubby’s verdict: AWESOME. I was busy grading papers and forgot to roast the garlic ahead of time for the aioli, so I improvised with garlic powder and a little Tabasco. I think my husband would eat that on everything now.
We cooked ours in a cast iron skillet, and needed only 3-4 minutes total per cake to cook. I recommend 3/4 cup dry quinoa to yield 2 cups cooked; I cooked a full cup, and we ended up with around 3/4 cup leftover.
Served with chicken/apple/gouda sausages, and will add a green salad next time. Will be awesome breakfast leftovers, too.
Great recipe! Although I’m wondering, could you there be an error somewhere? Mine only made 5 cakes. Thankfully, there were lots of sides, so no one went hungry. Quinoa quadruples in size, so I cooked 1/2 cup. I may have used a little less cheese than called for, but that shouldn’t have resulted in so few patties. It wasn’t 2 cups UNcooked quinoa was it? Cuz that woulda made a hecka lot of quinoa. Anyway. Great recipe though. Keep up the good work!
Haha. Just noticed my second sentence about the error contained an error. Touche!
Hi Carie! I know that quinoa “quadruples” in size, which I’ve always found true except for when I’m cooking less than 1 cup of uncooked quinoa (I have no idea why). I usually have to make 3/4 cup of uncooked quinoa to get about 2 cups. Maybe that was it?! Otherwise, I got nothin’! Glad you liked the cakes themselves :)
I like these quinoa cakes so well that when I went on retreat by myself I took along quinoa and purchased things at a local organic food store to make these–yum! they are wonderful and experimenting with additional ingredients is a great adventure! thank you for sharing this wonderful, creative & tasty recipe~
Made these quinoa cakes this afternoon and LOVE, LOVE, LOVE them. Didn’t have fontina cheese so substituted asiago and added an extra egg as my mixture seemed a bit dry before I did. Know these would make a great appetizer or side dish and my 4 yr old ate 3 of them so kid tested too!
These sound delish and I am going to make them tomorrow for dinner. I was curious if you happen to know the nutritional value of the cheesy quinoa cakes. I just wanted to know fat grams, fiber and protein. Maybe once I get the ingredients together, I can figure it out. They seem to be pretty healthy for the most part. Thank you in advance for your time.☺ Linda
I just made these. Did have the sticking problem. The last batch I dropped in the 1/4 cup blobs and them flattened them with the spatula. That helped a little. I may try some additional flour next time. Either way, they were extremely good, as was the sauce. Thanks!
I’m a big fan of quinoa – these look fantastic!
Just made these, eating them now… And YUM!
I just added a sprinkle of feta cheese instead of the salt.
Thanks. Love your site!
Very yummy. I made a batch as is and then made another batch substituting one cup of quinoa for a Crown Prince 6 oz. can of lump crab. Uber yummy.
Whoa, sounds amazing!
so delicious! i’ve made them a few times with a few variations. sundried tomato aioli on these is pretty awesome!
Do you think I could substitute corn starch for the flour? Would be awesome if they could be gluten free!
I would try subbing either cornstarch or rice flour, but if people are having trouble with the cakes staying together it might just be a recipe that doesn’t work well with a gluten-free diet like ours. I was going to repin this recipe on Pinterest until I read the disparaging remarks about we native Californians and decided that I didn’t need to spread that kind of vilification on my page, but I might try to come up with my own recipe and post that. But try it GF, what have you to lose?!
Yeah, I felt the same way about the comments about Californians. But hey, what do we know – we’re stupid.
Or you guys just both take things too personally. Get over it, it’s light hearted.
Hey—Us Canadians take jokes all the time
about us, EH? As I type this, I’m sitting in my
igloo, sipping on a Tim Horton’s coffee & giving
my sled dogs a rest from the daily grind. Maybe
I’ll even let them try a quinoa cake later. ;)
Does anyone know what the calorie count is for these? They look Fabulous!
I just made these for dinner and they are quite tasty! I put lime in my aioli because I didn’t have a lemon, but it was amazing. It was the first aioli I’ve ever made and I’m hooked! Thanks for a great recipe on both counts! Can’t wait to make them again.
These were amazing – I think I might try them with a sharper cheese next time? The fontina melted nicely, but didn’t have as strong of a taste as I would have liked.
I made these with my 6 year old tonight and they were super easy. The batter did not stick and stayed in perfect cakes while frying. I didn’t have the green onion so I used a bit of shallot instead. They were seriously delicious. Thanks for this great dish to serve vegetarian friends!
Made this and it was a huge hit! Love the versatility of the recipe, as well — looking forward to trying it again with some different veggies/cheese. Thanks!
This sounds like the perfect blend of health and gourmet yumminess. You might be a genius.
Thank you! This was awesome! My 2yo wasn’t a fan (but she’s 2 – she’s picky – haha), but my 9-month-old son couldn’t get enough and neither could my carnivorous husband! He was skeptical before tasting it but went back for seconds. :)
Even better: I had leftover quinoa in the fridge today so I chopped some plain chicken breast and shredded spinach, added a handful of Craisins and a few dollups of the aioli and – voila! – lunch salad! SO GOOD! This is going into my recipe file for SURE.
I just finished making these are they are the BOMB! I too had problems with the mixture falling apart, but I found if I just left the blob to cook, it solidified while cooking. I also tried a batch with double the egg and some more flour. It worked too but puffed up more due to the extra egg. I am serving them tomorrow, but am seriously tempted to eat the entire thing right now!
Thanks doll,
The Glamorous Housewife
I just have to say that I am completely addicted to these quinoa cakes! I made them a couple of weeks ago to accompany some butternut squash bisque, and I have made them three times since then. I loved them with my soup, but my favorite is with an over-easy egg on top. The fontina cheese and lots of pepper really make this amazing. Thanks for a wonderful recipe!
Can these be made, then frozen and reheated?
Hi Jenna! Yes they can be frozen, but I would still try to make them fresh if you can. The end results always seem better to me when made fresh. Good luck!
I made these tonight and they are Devine.-you know that saying, “if it tastes good it’s bad for you” ? Well these little quinoa cakes of gorgeousness are definitive proof that this is not true.I was doing these for the vegetarians in the house while the meat eater was cooking himself a couple of sausages. Upon tasting one he was seriously ready to toss the sausages out the window. Next time I might add a few little bits of chopped up olives, or sundried tomatoes or basil or chopped cilantro or I might not because they are awesome just how they are. I am from New Zealand where our ordinary old tasty cheddar cheese is delicious so I used that instead of fancy fontina.This recipe will definitely be a regular in this household.
Hi Leah! I’m so glad you like this recipe! Yes, one of the best things about it is that you can add whatever little bits and do swamp outs for whatever cheese according to preference. I love your idea of olives or sun-dried tomatoes…it would add a great tartness/brininess to the cakes. Thanks for reading :)
Yum! Quinoa is one of my new favorite foods. Is there any problem with the mixture sticking together. I’ve made veggie burgers before and some time have a problem with them falling apart.
Hi Catherine! You shouldn’t have a problem with sticking or falling apart…just make sure you have a well greased pan (nonstick is the best) and if you’re still a bit worried, you can always add a small amount of breadcrumbs to help hold the mixture together. Good luck!
Ok, I saved the majority of my mixture to try again tomorrow. Nothing I made tonight worked. BLAH. I’m going to add more egg too, I only had a very small egg. Thanks for getting back to me so fast!
What is Quinoa? And where do I find it?
Thank you
Dawn
Hi Dawn. Quinoa is like a grain but it’s actually a grass. You can find it at nearly any regular grocery store.
It’s really high in protein too…just fyi :)
Look in the grocery store near the couscous in the rice aisle :)
It was in the “health food” specialty section in my g-store. It’s a seed, and looks very tiny until cooked. There is also a red version.