Quinoa Buffalo Chicken Bites

One of the things that gets me super amped is when I'm able to whip something up from the ingredients we have laying around the house. Usually when I feel inspired or find a recipe on Pinterest that I just have to make, I'm missing half the ingredients.

Like the other day, I thought "I should make falafel for dinner - we have tomatoes and lettuce already!" But what we didn't have included chickpeas, onion, tzatziki, olives, cucumbers... basically, all the things you need for a decent Greek-inspired falafel dinner. Resulting in a trip to the store. Which is fine, except when that store is always Whole Foods and I'm always spending more than I should, and I end up doing this three times a week.

So when I got in the mood to make something with quinoa the other day, I was excited that I actually had quinoa. And I worked a bit backwards from there, (which is probably normal for most), by finding recipes I had already pinned, that I actually had all the ingredients for. Which led me to my new most-favorite recipe of the moment: Quinoa Buffalo Chicken Bites!

One bite of these scrumptious little balls of spicy heaven and I knew they would be the perfect sort-of-lighter dish to bring to our friends Super Bowl party. Except I got completely distracted by my mom being in town and totally forgot to make them. Oops.

However! To be fair, Scot and I were both incredibly busy making chili for our local farm & winery's Chili Day. I stuck with my theme-of-the-week and made Quinoa Sweet Potato Chili, while Scot made his 12-hour smoked brisket chili.

I won't lie, I'm pretty sure Scot's ended up being the bigger hit. (Apparently people want meat in their chili. Whatever.) But at least the people had options!

And so, my lovely friends were never able to taste my yum-tastic quinoa buffalo bites, but that's ok. I made another batch just for Scot & I the next day.. and we didn't have to share!

Quinoa Buffalo Chicken Bites

Ingredients:

- 1 cup shredded chicken

- hot sauce of choosing (I use Frank's Red Hot Wing Sauce)

- 1 cup cooked quinoa

- 1 egg

- 1/4 cup panko (I used gluten-free)

- 2 Tbsp flour (Used gluten-free, again!)

Steps:

1. Preheat oven to 350F & lightly grease a baking sheet.

2. For scrumptious shredded chicken: marinate & simmer chicken and hot sauce in a covered sauce pot over low to medium heat on stove. The chicken should be mostly covered by the hot sauce sauce. Cook for 10-15 minutes or until no longer pink in the middle. Shred chicken either in the pot, or place on cutting board to shred, then return to pot.

*I typically end up using 2 forks to shred - you want to make sure you don't over cook the chicken, or else it won't shred quite so easily! I like to keep it in the sauce, since that is really my only spice/flavoring for the dish.

3. While chicken is cooking, cook quinoa according to directions. (Typically, 1c water/broth to 1/2c quoina. Cover, boil, reduce heat, and let simmer until quinoa is soft and sprouted.)

4. Once chicken & quinoa are cooked - combine 1c chicken with 1c quinoa. Add egg, panko, and flour. Mix well.

5. Scoop 1-2" balls onto baking sheet - you should have about 12.

6. Bake for 15-18 minutes, until crispy and brown on the outside.

7. Add celery and blue cheese (or sauce of your choosing) and ENJOY!!