Keen on Quinoa

I'm still not sure exactly how to pronounce "quinoa."  However, I had a small bag of the trendy, mysterious seed lurking in my cabinet and finally decided to try it out tonight.  I found this delicious recipe for quinoa-stuffed peppers at Vegetarian Times:

1 onion, chopped
2 tbsp olive oil
2 stalks of celery, chopped
1 tbsp cumin
2 cloves of garlic, minced
10 oz. spinach, chopped
2 cans diced tomatoes
1 can black beans
3/4 cup quinoa
3 carrots, grated
1 1/2 cups pepper jack cheese, grated
4 red bell peppers, cut in half lengthwise


Preheat oven to 350.

Heat olive oil in a pan.  Add in celery and onion, and cook about 5 minutes.  Stir in cumin and garlic and cook for one more minute.  Mix in spinach and drained tomatoes (save the juice), and cook for another 5 minutes.  Add black beans, quinoa, carrots, and 2 cups water.  After it boils, let simmer, covered, about 20 minutes.  Mix in 1 cup of the cheese.  Season with salt and pepper to taste.

Fill pepper halves with the mixture.  Pour tomato juice into a baking pan.  Place stuffed peppers in pan, cover with foil, and bake 1 hour.  Divide the rest of the the cheese among the peppers.  Return to oven and bake another 15 minutes.

I made a half recipe so I wouldn't have too much extra.  The original recipe claims that freezing works well for this dish as well.