Slowcooker Beef & Vegetable Quinoa Soup

Today was another travelling day for me - 2 hours each way on the murderous Highway 2 from Red Deer to Spruce Grove!  I could seriously drive this route blind-folded, though I might take out a few fences approaching Century Road, but whatever.  Last night I had high hopes of prepping stuff for the crock-pot today, but I lost track of time IM'ing with my cousin, so guess what I was doing at 6am??

Here's my latest slow-cooker creation - really hearty soup which actually took just under 20 minutes to prep .  I've never put quinoa in the slowcooker so I was very curious to see how much it would explode over the course of the day, but am so happy to report that it stayed pretty much the same and just added it's delightful nutrition and that's it!  Oh - one thing, those little c-shaped quinoa membranes separate during the cooking, so just be mentally prepared for that - it's not tiny worms! 

Anyways - enjoy!

Slowcooker Beef & Vegetable Quinoa Soup
Ingredients:
1 lb beef stew meat
1 cup carrots, chopped
1 cup onions, chopped
1 cup celery, chopped
3 cloves garlic, coarsely chopped
a couple sprigs of fresh thyme
1 tsp dried oregano (a fresh sprig would be better, but I only had the thyme in the fridge!)
1 large bay leaf
1 dried chili pepper
4 cups beef broth
1 tsp each of salt & pepper (fresh ground of course!)
1 large can diced tomatoes and juice
1 can Campbell's condensed Cream of Tomato Soup
1/4 cup uncooked quinoa

Method:
It just couldn't be easier: chuck all ingredients into the slowcooker, give a stir and set timer for 8 hours on low.

I added the quinoa in last b/c I didn't know if I was going to chance an
explosion until the very last second!  My "risk" taken turned out very good!!

Come home from work and serve it up!!  Optional: serve with a sprinkle of parmesan cheese and some extra ground pepper.

Big chunks of meat so that the men forget it's healthy!