red.rice

Today at the Asian Market we discovered this beautiful red whole grain rice (I must confess that was the only reason I bought it) and I figured that taste wise it couldn’t be too far from the regular whole grain rice, and would give me a boost in my quest to create an original ‘eat-your-dinner’ recipe, even though I ended up mixing and matching ingredients to create a ‘sort-of-thai’, ‘kinf-of-vietnamese’ fried rice, it was well worth the effort. I also found out that Red Rice is being used in China as a dietary aid to lower cholesterol; they have even started developing medicines from this type of rice. So it is healthy too.

The whole point of this blog is to share inventive alternatives for everyday cooking, and this recipe was pretty much that! I bought my beautiful rice, but didn’t plan on much more than that. I left the market with one small can of coconut milk (good to have in case you have a curry emergency), cilantro, one piece of ginger, one carrot, and one giant sweet potato. I know the sweet potato sounds strange, but I found a Japanese baked sweet potato recipe that sounds amazing. I might write about it later. That is, if it turns out good.

I got home, got my groceries out, and realized that my choices weren’t all that consistent, and I really wanted to do something with the rice. I had week-old brussel sprouts, eggs, lime, and onions. I could make brussel sprout fried rice! That’s not too weird, is it? Well the lesson behind this story is you can make dinner with whatever you have at hand. I hope you like it! Eduardo gave it 4/5 ‘ed points’, he’s started rating recipes, I’d say it’s a VERY good score for ‘Brussel Sprout Fried Rice’, but we’ll call it ‘Red Rice’.

* I forgot to mention the rice! It is wonderful, it’s nutty and has a more delicate flavor than that of regular brown rice. The grains are also long and thin, which gives it a very nice texture.


R E C I P E

1 cup red whole grain rice
1 tablespoon of vegetable oil
1 pinch of chili pepper
1 small onion
1 ½ cups of sliced brussel sprouts
½ carrot in very small cubes
2 tablespoons of fish sauce
2 tablespoons of sugar
¼ cup of soy sauce
The juice of one lime
1 egg (optional)
2 + 1 tablespoons fresh chopped cilantro (keep some for garnish)
One one-inch piece of fresh ginger sliced
One clove of garlic sliced

For the rice:
This can be done up to one day ahead. Wash the rice, once is enough; this is not starchy rice. Soak it for a couple of hours, this is not necessary but it will cut the cooking time (whole grain rice tends to take longer). To cook it, rinse the water, measure two cups of water, put it on the stove on high heat until it boils, lower the heat, and cover until all the water has been absorbed or evaporated.

For the vegetables:
Heat a wok or a large pan, add the oil. When the oil thins, add chili pepper, the onion and chopped carrots. When the onion turns translucent, add the sliced brussel sprouts and cook for a couple of minutes. The brussel sprouts should be crunchy, and a bright green. Don’t overcook them, they get gray and bitter. Put aside.

For the sauce:
Mix the soy sauce, fish sauce, sugar and lime. Some chili paste would be nice too, if you like it spicier.

Toppings:
Fry the ginger and garlic.
Make a thin egg omelet (a little bit of sugar in here works great). Roll it, and slice it thinly.
Roughly chop the cilantro. You’ll mix two tablespoons with the rice and reserve one for garnish.

To finish:
Heat the rice + veggies quickly, mix the two together carefully. Set aside from the heat, incorporate the sauce or dressing + two tablespoons of cilantro. Top with omelet, the fried garlic and ginger and the reserved cilantro!





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mujadrah

Last night I felt like cooking something different, and since I hadn’t posted in such a long time, I thought I would come up with something inventive, an ‘eat your dinner’ original recipe! I had about half a cup each of lentils and brown rice, and some onions and garlic, which sounded good already, and I used lots of cumin and curry to give it a nice smoky taste. Turns out, unknowingly, I made and Arab dish! So much for inventive! I ‘googled’ rice and lentils, and not only did I find out my recipe was quite faithful to the original, but I also found out it had a much better name that rice and lentils! Mujadrah! (Pronounced M-Jed'der-a). Anyway, this dish is really good, I highly recommend it. It is also vegetarian and very inexpensive. So here is it! Enjoy.

R E C I P E

This recipe is good for two people, just double, triple if you have more people or are really hungry.

½ cup of French lentils
½ cup of brown rice
1 onion
2 cloves of garlic
1 small bouillon cube
1 teaspoon of cumin
1 teaspoon of curry powder
Pepper to taste
1 tablespoon of vegetable oil
1 1/2 cups of water

Sauté the onions and garlic in the oil. Add the spices, the rice and the lentils. Cook for a couple of minutes, making sure everything is coated with the spices. Add the water and the bouillon cube. When the water starts to boil, turn the temperature down and cover. When all the water has been absorbed or evaporated your dish is ready! If either your rice or your lentils are still hard after all the water has been absorbed, this could happen if your grains have been in your cupboard for a long time, just add more and repeat the process until they are done (boil, lower temp, and cover).
I hope you enjoy this, we sure did!


* I just read this is the dish (pottage) that Jacob sold to his brother, Esau, in exchange for his birthright. Genesis 25:29. People make up all sorts of stuff!

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arroz.con.pollo

I’m baking a carrot cake, and since it takes a long time, I thought I would spend it wisely and write a post about a dish, that it my mind at least, bears some similarities with carrot cake.

‘Arroz con pollo’ is literally ‘rice with chicken’, although nothing could be further than the truth, because it is closer to ‘rice with a whole bunch of things AND chicken’. Arroz con pollo is actually a great vegetarian dish if you take out the chicken, although if you take out the chicken you end up with ‘rice’. I had a home ec teacher in seventh grade, who taught us how to make a version of this rice without chicken and called it ‘garden rice’ which is a nice name that all you vegetarians out there can use if want to be fancy.

Arroz con pollo is a typical Central American dish; it is a one pot meal (which is great) especially for Ed who is perpetually on dishwashing duty. In Costa Rica, they like to make ‘arroz con pollo’ for big family reunions or birthday parties, in a huge pot that is only used at Christmas to boil tamales, or for this rice. They serve it with black beans and potato chips, I don’t know how this came to be, but my guess is that since there ARE potato chips in most parties, people just started eating them on the side, and it became a tradition to have potato chips with the dish, although from the outside (us foreigners) it does seem pretty strange, this is perfectly normal for Eduardo though.

Ok, so carrot cake and arroz con pollo aren’t all that similar, the one thing they have in common is they both have carrots in very small pieces. Maybe it was the color that reminded me of the rice. It doesn’t matter really, this rice is very good, it has tons of vegetables, it’s easy, it’s one pot (well two, close enough), it has a nice presence too, and if you make it vegetarian and you are NOT a vegetarian it could go nicely with rotisserie chicken. And tortillas! But that’s probably too much to ask. You can also substitute the chicken for small shrimp and serve it with a wedge of lemon, and you’ll get ‘arroz con camarones’.

(The first layer of my cake just came out of the oven and it smells and looks great! I will definitely post about it! It will be my first sweet post!)

R E C I P E

Arroz con Pollo

1 cup long grain rice
1 chicken breast
1 teaspoon of salt
1 carrot
¼ of a bell pepper (any color)
1 small onion
1 handful of green beans or green peas (about ½ a cup)
2 cloves of garlic
2 chicken bouillon cubes (small)
2 cups of water
1 bay leaf
1 tablespoon of oil
¼ teaspoon of food coloring (annatto, onoto, achiote, or bija they’re all the same, it is a natural coloring that comes from a South American tree, that is sometimes called ‘lipstick tree’ because of the color of its seeds) this is not necessary at all, ‘achiote’ has no flavor, it is just aesthetic). You can use any food coloring; even liquid food coloring is fine if you dissolve it in the stock first. Aim for a light orange.

In a small pot place the chicken breast, the water, the bouillon cubes and the bay leaf. Cook on high until it boils, cover, lower the temperature, and let it simmer. This will create a quick stock.

In the meantime chop all you vegetables in small peaces. In a large pot, heat the oil until its smoking; add all your vegetables, while stirring every now and then. Take the chicken out of the stock you’ve just made and put on a chopping board. By now you should start to feel the ‘aromas’ (this a very Latin way of cooking), add the rice to the vegetables, stir it until it is coated with the oil and all the ingredients are mixed well, add the stock (if you are using food coloring dissolve it in the stock before adding it to the rice). Stir once, and no more (if you stir rice too much it will get sticky), wait until it boils; lower the temperature to the minimum and cover. The rice will be done when the water evaporates.

Chop the chicken into small pieces and add to the rice when it is almost dry, mix lightly and serve!

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