It should be spelled Bore-at, not Borat. Yawnsville! Why the hell all the buzz on this movie? I found it neither offensive nor funny, just long, boring, and really rather sad. I'm (clearly) no prude and am in fact a big fan of the butt-fart-poop joke genre as well as truly stupid, crude, slapstick humor (Old School? Austin Powers? Even Jackass had its sick moments...). However, I've never been a fan of acts that trick unsuspecting people into looking like complete asses, so I guess Borat and I weren't meant for each other (another big clue, that I clearly should have heeded: I can't stand the Da Ali G show). I fought sleep the whole time and felt a bit depressed when we left. Weird.

Well, on to something much more fascinating...brace yourselves!...quinoa. Ooooh! And again. I know, I've already written about it, but I made up a couple of recipes and got a cool one from reader Donna, for quinoa bars, so here I am again. I had cooked up another - big - batch of plain quinoa, and after eating it for breakfast for a couple of days I decided to innovate with it a bit. First up, quinoa pancakes. As you can tell from reading here, I cook mostly with fresh food, but once in awhile a good mix does come in handy, such as Krusteaz Wheat & Honey Pancake Mix. I loved this stuff in college, since you only have to add water. It makes soft, fluffy, whole-grain pancakes and best of all, you can mess around like crazy with the ingredients. I've been addding nuts, fruit, wheat germ, flax seeds, yogurt, juice - whatever I have on hand or am in the mood for - to these for years. And today, yes, I added cooked quinoa. Since all you add is water, I just put two cups of Krusteaz mix in a bowl, with a bunch (2 cups?) of cooked quinoa, and added enough water to make a thick batter. I cooked the cakes one at a time in a small, non-stick skillet, cooled them on racks, and froze them between sheets of parchment paper (to keep them from freezing together). Voila, instant breakfast! One pancake is one serving - microwaved until warm, topped with a little cottage cheese and sweetened berries, mmmm, a perfect winter's breakfast. (Delicious with maple syrup as well, by the way! And same technique works for other leftover cooked grains - amaranth made yummy pancakes.)

The other recipe I'm experimenting with is quinoa banana bread. I adapted a pretty standard recipe - and by adapted I mean seriously messed with, so we'll see how it turns out. Luckily quick breads are pretty forgiving. It's just out of the oven, smelling quite fabulous, I must say. Update: tastes quite fabulous as well, John agrees. Sweet, dense, crunchy (with nuts), definitely whole-grain looking and tasting, yet moist. (Recipes posted in comments, below.)