Tonight I’m trying a Mexican Inspired low carb recipe for dinner. John and I are international eaters. We like all cuisines and cook in a bunch of different styles at home. When we cook, I skew Caribbean, Latin and Indian. He skews Asian, Italian, and American. Mexican is high on our list and we probably have a Mexican inspired dish weekly. It’s just so easy to make Mexican food fit into our diets since John is on his permanent quasi-low-carb way of eating, and I am doing the 21 day fix and restarting a lower carb pescetarian lifestyle. (cuz Kaya’s eating more food and nursing a bit less, hooray!)
When we visit Mexico we tend to go off the resort and eat where the residents of whatever city we’re in eat. That helped to push our cooking in a Mexican-Inspired way, even if the dish isn’t actually Mexican. For example, we use chipotle sauce or peppers and cilantro in our chili, and I use it in my breakfast beans. Tonight we’re having a dish I’ve made a million times Camarones Diablos (which translates literally to: Spicy ass, burn your entire mouth off, you’re gunna have to drink so much cold water, Devil Shrimp) but I’m also trying something new…
Being Caribbean, we grew up eating rice every day. I seriously could sit down and eat a pot of rice by myself right now, I swear to you. But since we’re low carbish, I replaced rice with quinoa and only get my real rice fix when I’m really feigning it. (I think it’s hard wired into my brain as a comfort food now.) So tonight we’re trying Mexican Rice Quinoa.
I’m using some Mexican inspired flavors and ingredients like La Morena chipotles and jalepenos, cilantro, lime….
CAMARONES DIABLOS
You’ll need: shrimp, 1 onion, 2 cloves garlic, handful of cilantro, adobo, salt and pepper (to taste), La Morena chipotles in adobo sauce (1 can), jalapenos (a can of pickled works great), worchestershire sauce, oil, butter, red wine, 1/2 a lime.
1. Open, de-vein and shell your shrimp (or defrost if you buy the pre-shelled frozen ones like I do) season ’em with adobo powder, pepper and some of the sauce from the chipotle can
2. Slice up your onions, mince your garlic, and dice your jalepenos. Pop em in the pan with a bit of oil and butter and throw some salt n pepper on top.
3. Let that soften for a bit while you rough chop your chipotles, then add them to the pan along with worchestershire sauce and red wine. Let it simmer a bit.
4. Pop in your shrimp and stir em in to the sauce. They’ll cook in just a few minutes. Boom you’re done. Squirt some fresh lime on that bad boy and throw some chopped cilantro on top. YUM!
This takes me about 20-25 minutes.
I tried to find a recipe similar to what I do so you could have specifics with measurement. This one came closest.
If you want to make this recipe a lil bit cleaner…don’t use oil/butter in the pan, soften the onion and garlic in some fat free broth instead, before you put the wine and worchestershire in.
ONE PAN MEXICAN QUINOA
This is the recipe I used…and altered…of course.
For my version you’ll need: 1 cup quinoa, 1 cup veggie broth, 1/2 an onion (diced), 2 cloves garlic (minced), 1/2 can La Morena sliced jalapenos (chopped), 1 can of black beans (drained and rinsed), 1 can of diced tomatoes, salt, pepper, cumin, chili powder, salt and black pepper (to taste), lime, cilantro.
1. Pop everything into a pan except lime and cilantro.
2. Bring to a boil, then reduce heat and cover to let it simmer while quinoa cooks
3. 20-25 minutes later, boom, you’re done. Fluff with a fork and throw cilantro and lime on top.
John loved the quinoa and so did Roey. It’s definitely a winner and I will use this a bunch in the future. I’ll try adding diced avocado in, and use more jalepeno next time for a lil more kick.
I love healthy recipes with original latin flavors #client
This looks delicious Danielle and it’s healthy. I’m pinning!
Thanks Adanna, do you like spicy food?
My mouth is seriously watering! Everything looks so good
that quinoa recipe looks delicious! yummy 🙂
We cook internationally too, when we do cook. We mainly make Jamaican and other Caribbean foods but we throw in mostly Chinese, Thai and Indian once in a while. I’m not a fan on Mexican food though (I know that I’m in the minority with this because everyone I’ve met love Mexican) but the food looks good. My hubby and son love quinoa too but I don’t. I cook it and eat it though because it’s healthier than rice. Sounds like you are doing a good job making good healthy good choices. Keep it up 🙂
It was so delicious. And so hot. And so good. And so hot.
I couldn’t stop eating it which only made things worse. I was dripping in sweat. But I loved every second of it. The house smelled so good when I stepped in the door. I’m glad the meal lived up to the hype.
Can’t wait to eat it again.
I love the Shrimp recipe and the ONE PAN MEXICAN QUINOA! I am trying to eat low carbs and these look so healthy. I want to make these recipes for my family. I bet they taste so good.