Posts tagged Rice
Salad or not salad? – Salad of grain medley with cannellini, shrimps, artichokes in a herb-lemon dressing
Jul 12th
Salade ou pas salade? – Salade tiède de céréales et mélange aux haricots blancs, crevettes, artichauts, vinaigrette aux citron et herbes
Lately I have not been too well, that’s why I haven’t been posting any recipe on a regular basis like I used to, and my desire and energy for cooking has gone down, hopefully it will pick up at some point. I have no motivation for sitting in front of my computer either, but I sincerely miss everyone, people I met through this blog have been incredibly supportive, kind and generous. Thanks so much for anyone who reads my blogs and leaves genuine comments, they mean a lot to me. I apologize if I have had a difficult time to catch up with everyone, I have had very low energy level and some health issues, but hopefully will get back to my regular routine soon.
I started writing this recipe about three weeks ago and never managed to finish it, it took me forever…so here it is after such a long time. This salad is composed with a well balanced mixture of grains, vegetables, and proteins, such a nutritious and flavorful dish.
I call this a salad since it has a dressing but it can be called anything you like, and can be consumed lukewarm or cold. The particularity of this dish is that I mixed eight varieties of grains and seeds such as brown rice, oats, lentils, pumpkin seeds, etc… for a mixed variety of textures. Maybe you’ll think this look more like a bird meal to you than a gourmet salad. It is definitely questionable, but after you taste it, you will think bird ingredients can taste incredibly tasty.
The grains have been enhanced with vegetables, and seafood which complement the grains quite well. This is nothing complicated, you just need various grains in your pantry.
Ingredients for 2-3
- 200 g of mixed grains such as:
- brown rice
- wheat flakes
- sorghum rice
- buckwheat
- pearl barley
- black rice
- pearl rice
- red lentil
- 1 tbs roasted pumpkin seeds
- 10 large shrimps
- 4 medium artichokes
- 3 tbs dry white wine
- 70 g cannellini beans cooked (either dried or canned)
Ingredients for the herb-lemon vinaigrette
- 3 tbs avocado oil
- juice of one lemon
- zest of 1/2 lemon
- 1 tsp tarragon, chopped
- 1 tsp parsley, chopped
- 1 tsp chives, chopped
- 1 tbs red onion, finely chopped
- 1 garlic clove, crushed
- one pinch cayenne pepper
- salt and pepper
Preparation
Mix all grains together and steam them. You can steam them the same way you would steam rice, even if there are many varities of grains, some of them cook a little faster than others but it does not make a big difference cooking them all together. You can use a rice cooker or use the regular technique using a simple pot.
Trim artichokes, removing the hard leaves around, and cutting off the top of the artichoke. Cut in quarters and place in a container filled with water and lemon juice to prevent the artichokes from darkening.
In a pan, heat olive oil, add 1 garlic clove, then drain artichokes and add to the pan, stir for a few minutes, coating the artichokes with garlic and oil, then add wine, salt and pepper. Stir well. Cover with a lid and cook at medium heat until artichokes are tender. Remove from heat and set aside.
Saute shrimps in olive oil, add salt and pepper and set aside.
In a large container, mix steamed grains with artichokes, cannellini beans, shrimps, pumpkin seeds. Pour vinaigrette on top by mixing all ingredients together. Stir well and serve. You can serve at room temperature or cold.
A far away cousin of vegetable paella – Saffron brown rice with mixed vegetables
Mar 19th
Un cousin éloigné de la paella végétarienne – Riz brun au saffran et méli mélo de petits légumes
It’s time for some rice…rice and potatoes are two ingredients I rarely use, French people eat a LOT of potatoes, at my parents my mom rarely made them, Italians are more pasta eaters than potato eaters. A while ago, I started buying all the different kinds of rices I ran into, from black rice, to bamboo rice, any shape and color rice I saw. It seems like the excitement faded away, but I don’t want to leave rice aside, because I love it. It’s nutritious, healthy and can make wonderful side dishes.
The world of food has so many items to explore than sometimes, you get caught trying out new ingredients, and leaving aside the ones you know too well.
This rice has a rich and deep yellow color you get with combining saffron and paprika or pimenton as they say in Spain but I found Spanish pimenton to have a more smokey flavor.
Basically the rice is steamed in a vegetable broth with saffron and paprika, so it comes out almost orange. Such a vibrant color to have in ones plate.
Plain white rice is great with spicy dishes, it enables to decrease the powerful and strong flavors of the spices and balances everything perfectly. Sometimes I enjoy some more intricate rice dishes like this one, you can just eat it as a main dish and as is, because it’s a whole meal in itself and full of fragrant flavors. I certainly don’t want to call this vegetarian paella, which would be so wrong, but it has some similarities in some of the spices and cooking method, even though I did not use a paella tray, nor used Spanish rice.
Ingredients for 2-3
- 5.29 0z (or 150 g) brown rice
- one dose saffron
- 1/4 tsp Spanish pimenton
- vegetable broth (rice x 2)
- 1 shallot
- 1 garlic clove, crushed
- 1 tbs mixed oregano, very finely chopped
- 1/2 red bell pepper, cut in very small cubes (1/4 inch)
- 1 cup fresh peas (or frozen)
- 1/2 bunch asparagus, cut in small chunks (1/2 inch)
- 1 tbs olive oil
- salt and pepper
Preparation
In a rice cooker or regular pot, mix broth, rice, saffron, pimenton and salt. Let it sit for a few minutes until the saffron has dissolved. For broth quantities, I use about twice the amount of rice, in this case, since it’s brown rice, which takes harder to cook, I use about 3 times its quantity. If using rice cooker, broth needs to be at 2 cm above the level of the rice.
Heat olive oil in a pan, add shallots and let them soften. Add all the mixed vegetables and stir well. Cover and cook for 5-7 minutes or until the vegetables are cooked but still firm, add garlic and oregano and cook for a few additional minutes to get the flavors out.
Mix in the rice, stir well until all the vegetables are well incorporated into the rice.
Always so special – Green risotto
Feb 10th
Sempre così speciale – Il riso verde
Riso verde is a specialty I used to eat at our family restaurant in Italy, I haven’t eaten it anywhere else. My dad’s relatives have un’albergo-ristorante (an hotel and restaurant) Al Lago in San Lazzaro that also has a restaurant where they make wonderful specialties like this one. All their pasta, tagliatelle, gnocchi, cannelloni, etc…are homemade, therefore many locals go there to celebrate special events such as weddings, baptims and have traditional “gargantuesques” meals. Last time I was there was for my cousin’s wedding but riso verde was not part of the menu to my big disappointment. You can also find some tourists during the summer in San Lazzaro, but being a small little town in Pesaro Province, and not as touristy as Rimini or some other bigger cities on the Adriatic Coast, the summers are usually not as invaded by tourists trying to indulge on local cuisine.
I have always loved this riso verde, basically it’s somehow a risotto, but they call it simply “riso” (rice). Usually as any other “primo” meaning first dish, it’s served by itself, and not as a side dish. To really appreciate it, you should really savor it on its own, and with nothing else to distract you from its wonderful taste and texture.
I was tempted to dress it up but then I resisted and I decided to leave it as it’s served at Al Lago. I added a little extra spinach, the original recipe has less spinach, and a little more cream, so has a lighter green color. You can adjust the spinach and cream quantity. I kept mine on the healthy side, but nothing prevents you from adding a little less spinach and a little cream. In Italy, they use Panna, which is a thick cream, heavy cream or crème fraîche can be substituted but it has a little more of a tangy flavor.
The trick here is to mash to spinach into a purée type of a texture so when you mix it with the risotto, you see no spinach particles. The green color of the spinach needs to be blended with the rice.
Also, I would not use a cooking wine but a nice dry white wine more like Vernaccia or some Northern Italian wines.
Ingredients for 2
- 1 cup arborio rice
- 1/2 shallot, chopped
- 2 cups fresh spinach or 1/3 lb frozen
- 1 cup (to be adjusted) dry white wine
- 1 cup (to be adjusted) vegetable broth
- 2 tbs parmigiano reggiano
- 1 tbs heavy cream
- salt and pepper
Preparation
First start preparing the spinach. If using fresh spinach, wash them well, and boil in salted water for about 5-7 minutes. Drain well squeezing extra water, and chop them finely first, then with a little cream, place in a blender and reduce into a purée type of consistency. Set aside.
In a pot, heat olive oil, then add shallots. Let them brown then add rice. Stir rice to coat rice with the olive oil. Add gradually wine and broth and keep stirring. Add spinach 10 minutes before rice has finished cooking. Add cream and continue stirring. At the end add parmigiano. Stir well all ingredients so that risotto has absorbed flavors. Serve hot.
A different kind of basmati – Coral red basmati with mustard greens, peas and shrimps
Dec 12th
Un basmati pas comme les autres – Basmati rouge corail aux crevettes, fanes de moutarde et pois
I think by now I must have tried almost all the different kinds of rice on the market, going from basic to fancy. The funny thing is that I am not a big rice eater but when I see a kind I never tasted, I buy it.
For me, rice is that ingredient I enjoy but that I rarely cook. Then when I eat it, I am thinking I should make it more often. Time goes by, and rice is still left in the pantry.
This time, I found this beautiful coral red basmati at Whole Foods and was curious about its taste and texture, and after one month of staring at it, I decided to make something out of it. I liked its “marketing” name “coral red” is quite a pretty name for a red rice and thinking about it I bought it mainly because I was seduced by its name which I found quite sexy. Americans are certainly great at marketing!
I love rice bowls, they’re nutritious and you can make a “one-meal” bowl, besides whole rices are perfect for that. Coral red basmati rice does not taste exactly like regular basmati, It has a pretty color but is less aromatic.
French people are not big rice eaters, they eat a lot more potatoes as primary carbohydrate and of course bread. I remember a commercial on TV when I was a child for Uncle Ben’s rice “Le riz qui ne colle jamais“, “the rice that never sticks”, in his little plastic bag, and that was the only rice I would eat. My mom creamy risotto was so unappealing comparing to Uncle Bens! I was fascinated by its TV commercial of this old and big Southern American guy with a thick American accent and his “Uncle Bens! le riz qui ne colle jamais!”.
Ingredients for 4
- 280 g coral red rice (about 70 g per person)
- 1 large bunch mustard greens, chopped
- 24 large uncooked shrimps
- 1/2 cup frozen or fresh peas
- 2 shallots, diced
- 2 garlic cloves, crushed
- 1 small piece ginger, grated
- 1 tbs mustard seeds
- 1 tbs soy sauce
- 1 tbs olive oil
Preparation
Heat olive oil in a pan, brown shallots, 1 garlic clove, ginger and mustard seeds. Stir well and let all ingredients brown.
Steam rice in a rice cooker or regular pot.
Cook mustard greens in boiling water for about 5-7 minutes, until cooked. Drain, squeeze extra water and chop finely.
Add shrimps to onion, garlic, ginger mixture and cook for about 5 minutes until shrimps are cooked, add peas and mustard greens, salt and pepper and cook for another 10 minutes. (If using fresh peas, they need to cook longer)
Add rice and stir well. Add 1 garlic clove crushed and 1 tbs soy sauce, stir well, let it cook for another 5 minutes and serve as a side dish or as a full meal.
A wild side – Wild rice "à la forestière" with mushrooms, carrots and walnuts
Nov 15th
Un côté sauvage – Riz sauvage à la forestière aux champignons, carottes et noix
I haven’t realized Thanksgiving is coming soon, then I am leaving to visit my family in France shortly after, not sure I will have time to make it to Italy but we’ll see. It’s been one year I did not go home, and I am starting to have the one year “itch”. I remember I made this rice for Christmas for my parents guests, many years ago as a side dish to stuffed quails with ris de veau (sweatbreads) and everyone loved the whole thing. It was the time I still could eat a bird.
My mom would always invite this longtime Italian girlfriend (from the same town in Italy) with her French husband and son for Christmas and I was not looking forward to it. Those guys were the snobbiest, uptight and annoying people I have ever seen, always criticizing and making fun of others. But every year, my mom would feel so guilty to let them spend Christmas by themselves, so she invited them at home, and we would spend January 1st in their home. That was like a punishment to me! So the first time I made this rice was for them as a side dish. At least something came out of those Christmases. My mom always had this sense of “duty” or “obligation” to take care of people and sometimes it can be overwhelming. I bet everyone has those memories of some family dinners and having to deal with some unpleasant parents’ friends.
It’s a very simple dish but quite tasty and always a beautiful and refined accompaniment to a fish or meat. What is called “à la forestière” in French is mainly a dish that has mushrooms, “forestière” meaning from the forrest (forêt = forrest). Rice à la forestière is a French classic, so this one has been modified and made it into a more modern and light version with a twist. The nutty flavor of wild rice enhanced by walnuts is delightful.
Ingredients for 4
- 300 g wild rice
- 2 carrots
- 2 shallots
- 1.5 cups cremini or wild mushrooms
- 1.5 tbs walnut, chopped
- 1/5 tbs parsley, finely chopped
- 1 tbs olive oil
Preparation
Cook rice for about 40 minutes until cooked. You can either use a rice cooker or cook it in a pot the traditional way.
In a pan, heat olive oil, add shallot and carrots. Cover with a lid and let the mixture cook, then after 10 min add mushrooms, cool for an additional 10 min or until the water has evaporated. Add cooked rice, stir and adjust with salt and pepper. Add walnuts and parsley. Mix well and serve.
Something to deal with traffic – Riz au lait with strawberry compote
Nov 6th
Une petite douceur pour se remettre du trafic – Riz au lait à la compote de fraises
My Friday afternoon was spent driving back and forth from San Francisco to the East Bay. I completely forgot that on Friday afternoons when it rains the freeways are completely insane and the traffic is worse than Paris périphérique aux heures de pointe (during rush hours). I had to drop off some food for some clients on the other side of the bridge and I thought I was never going to make it. A trip that usually takes 30 minutes, took me 2 hours. Besides I am a terrible driver, never had an accident, just a few bumper scratches but I always feel something might happen because I have no concept of space. I have no idea if the car is two meters or three meters behind me.
So when I got home, I made myself a small sweet treat, to calm my adrenaline rush from all the freeway movement.
I don’t know if “riz au lait” is something very popular in the US, I have never seen it served anywhere, maybe it’s considered an “unsophisticated” or rudimentary dessert, I don’t know. In France, riz au lait is something very common, that every household knows how to make. Now I like riz-au-lait with some fruit compote or caramel, or something underneath the rice.
The tricky part is to keep the rice in a creamy vanilla sauce. Rice tends to absorb the liquid, then you might end up with some dry rice which is not very good. You need a lot of milk (and preferably whole milk) and let to rice simmer at very slow heat for about one hour. I used reduced fat milk and tasted great too. There are as many versions of riz au lait as there are cooks in France, so this one is just my version. You can flavor it with cinnamon if you like it. I am a vanilla fan so I don’t want to spoil the natural vanilla flavor with cinnamon.
Ingredients for 4-6
- 5.30 oz (or 150 g) round rice, I used arborio
- 4.2 cups (or 1 liter) whole milk or reduced fat milk
- 4 tbs heavy cream
- 1 vanilla bean split
- raw sugar to your tastes
- 2 tbs chopped walnuts
- 1 lb strawberries
- 1 or 2 tbs light brown sugar
Preparation
Rinse the rice under running water. Bring a water to a boil and cook rice for about 6-7 minutes. Drain. Bring milk and cream to a boil with vanilla bean split. Add rice and let it simmer at very low temperature for about one hour making sure it does not stick. After 30 minutes, add sugar and stir. Add chopped walnuts.
Wash and cut strawberries, cook at medium temperature with light brown sugar until strawberries turn into a sauce.
You can eat the rice lukewarm or cold.
Place some strawberries at the bottom of a cup then add rice on top. Decorate with fresh strawberries and walnut bits.
A taste from far away – Shrimps in a coconut colombo sauce on spiced vanilla basmati rice
Sep 15th
A goût qui vient de loin – Crevettes sauce colombo et noix de coco sur riz Basmati épicé à la vanille
The first interesting part of this dish is the rice…yes indeed. An Indian friend of mine who arrived straight from Cochin used to prepare this type of rice and I loved its subtle fragrance. So now anytime I cook something with an exotic flair, I always prepare rice this way. Rice is steamed in a water that had been infused with lots of spices, so when the rice cooks, it absorbs a distinct and very unique flavor.
I substituted cinnamon with vanilla in my recipe. I am not a huge cinnamon fan, I liked cinnamon when I lived in France, but since I moved to the US, I think I got a little turned off by it, just because, almost all desserts and sweets have cinnamon in it, and I even got served many times cinnamon on my cappuccino which I was unable to drink. What is it with cinnamon? A little discreet touch once in a while is fine, but not all over the place. The funny thing is I have such a cinnamon phobia that when I order desserts in restaurants, I always ask the waiter if the dessert contains cinnamon. Then I get the weird stare as if something is wrong with me. Oh well.
The second interesting part of this dish are the shrimps. Well, the shrimps are cooked with a colombo spice mixture, colombo is a typical creole spice mixture made out of turmeric, cumin, cloves, black pepper, coriander, fenugreek, mustard and ginger. What we call DOM TOM (Département et Territoires d’Outre Mer) in France are the Antilles Islands such as Martinique, Guadeloupe, La Reunion, etc…therefore territories and districts that belong to France and who do have a créole cuisine, so yes many French go on vacation on those islands and they do come back with some new exotic recipes. Colombo is somehow the créole curry.
Since there is no perfect meal if there are no vegetables, I served a simple side dish of grilled zucchini…no spices, since the rice and shrimps do have lots of flavors, the zucchini balance the whole dish by being simple and neutral but nonetheless tasty.
So here we have a quite spicy and flavorful dish, you will be in Martinique and in Kerala at the same time, isn’t it a great trip? Oh let’s not forget Tahiti for the vanilla flavor.
Ingredients for 4
For the shrimps
- 24 large jumbo shrimps, deveined
- 1 small yellow onion chopped
- 2 garlic cloves, crushed
- 1 small piece of ginger, grated
- 1/2 tsp colombo powder
- 1/2 cup coconut milk
- 1 tbs olive oil
- salt and pepper
For the rice
- 1 cup basmati rice
- 1 vanilla pod
- 3 cloves
- 4 cardamom pods, cut lengthwise
- 1/3 tsp cumin seeds
- 1/3 tsp fennel seeds
- 1/3 tsp coriander seeds
- 2 cups water
For the zucchini
- 4 zucchini
- 1 tbs olive oil
- juice of 1/2 lemon
- salt and pepper
- 1 tbs cilantro, chopped
Preparation
First prepare the “spiced water” for the rice. Add water to a pot, then add cloves, cumin, cardamom, fennel and vanilla bean split in two. Scrape the beans. Bring the water to a boil and let it simmer for about 20-30 minutes to infuse the spices. Remove from pot and let it cool.
Place rice in a pot and add “spiced water”. To steam my rice I never measure quantity of water. I always add enough water so that 0.4 inches are above the rice level and I get a perfectly cooked rice. If the quantity of water has reduced (it certainly did) while boiling you might want to add some in order that rice gets 0.4 inches extra on top of its surface. Bring to a boil, then cover with lid and reduce heat to a minimum. Cook for about 20 minutes at very low heat. Remove from heat and let it sit for about 10 minutes before fluffing with a fork.
Heat olive oil in a pan. Add onions and ginger, brown them, then add garlic. Add colombo powder. Stir well then add coconut milk, let reduce a little then add shrimps.
Grill zucchini in a grill pan or regular grill, add olive oil, lemon juice, salt and pepper and sprinkle with cilantro.
Serve spooning 3 tbs rice in a plate, top with shrimps and serve zucchini on the side.
I ate all the fishes in the ocean – Mahi mahi fillet and candied lemon with cardamom on saffron rice with wilted dandelions
Sep 13th
J’ai mangé tous les poissons de l’océan – Filets de mahi mahi au citron confit et à la cardamome sur riz saffrané et pissenlits sautés
The funny thing is that if you look at the picture, you wouldn’t have any clue that under the rice, there is a layer of beautiful wilted dandelions. Even through the transparent glass, you cannot see those colorful greens.
I just love dandelions. In France, we get a different kind, they’re smaller, and the leaves are more dented and are more flavorful, probably because the ones you get here in the store are grown and not wild. When I was young with my parents we used to go pick them up from fields, that was the fun part, then the cleaning part, I hated it. They have tons of dirt and you have to remove the bad leaves from the outside, it can take the whole day and really I would have preferred to do something more “kids friendly”.
They grow everywhere, but not all year round. You need to pick them up in March, then after, they grow big and their yellow flower blossoms. I loved those so much, I was going crazy for those pissenlits. My mom prepared them with lard fumé (our version of smoked bacon) and croutons. The ones you get here are too hard to eat as a salad, so you have to cook them like spinach. Either you saute them directly in the pan, or you boil them in water, then saute them in olive oil and garlic. Those dandelions tend to be slightly on the bitter side, not fitting everyone’s taste. I love it.
I need to diversify my posts since there are almost no meat recipes, it’s just that I do not enjoy cooking meat. I run into some article about Brendan Brazier the famous tri-athlete who is vegan and explained how he gets tons of energy just from a raw food diet and that’s the best diet you can follow for performance. It’s just amazing to see how vegetables and grains can turn your body into a turbo engine.
I am not a tri-athlete nor planning on becoming one for sure (I can barely swim), nor planning on living on just raw vegetables, but I really think we have to nourish our bodies with the best possible nutrients and I don’t think meat is included in that list.
Going back to my fish, it’s a great combination of ingredients, flavors and textures. The cardamom added to the fish and the candied lemon turns this dish into an elegant entrée. The saffron rice is so delicately flavored and lays on top of the wilted dandelions, like a perfect color match.
I used fish stock I brought back from France, they come in cubes and are an alternative to fish stock (Fumet de poisson, if you don’t have any).
I will leave the fishes alone for a while…if I can…but I can’t promise it.
Ingredients for 4
For the mahi mahi
- 4 fillets of mahi mahi or any other dense white fish
- 4 lemon slices
- 1 tbs honey
- 1/2 tsp cardamom
- vegetable broth
- 1 shallot, sliced (en brunoise)
- 2 carrots, diced (en brunoise)
- veg broth or fish broth dehydrated
- 1/3 cup white wine
- thyme and laurel
- salt and pepper
For the saffron rice
- 1 cup (or 200 g) basmati rice
- 1 saffron dose
- 1.26 cup (or 300 ml) vegetable or chicken broth
For the dandelions
- 1 bunch dandelions
- 2 garlic cloves
- 1 tbs olive oil
For the sauce
- 1.6 oz (or 5 cl) dry white wine
- 3 tsp fish stock (dehydrated)
- 1 tbs crème fraiche or heavy cream
Preparation
Start making the candied lemon. Pre-heat oven at 375F. Bring 1 cup of water to a boil, then add thin sliced of lemon and boil for about 2-3 minutes depending on juiciness and ripeness of your lemon. Drain. Melt honey in a small pan and add lemon. Cook for another 3 minutes. Place in the oven for about 20 minutes (you can use an aluminum foil to place the lemon slices)
For the saffron rice, you can use the traditional way of steaming rice in a pot or a rice cooker. It depends on the time I have and still use both. Mix saffron and broth together, and let saffron dissolve for about 20 minutes. Add broth to rice, bring to a boil, then reduce heat at the minimum, cover with a lid and cook for about 20 minutes. Remove from heat and let it sit for about 10 minutes before fluffing with a fork.
Bring large salted pot of water to a boil, add dandelions and cook for about 10 minutes until the dandelions are cooked but do not overcook. Drain well, and squeeze extra water. Heat olive oil in a pan, add crushed garlic, stir for 1 minutes without burning the garlic, and add dandelions, salt and pepper, stir well, to mix all ingredients. You can keep the dandelions aside and sauté them at the end before serving so they don’t get cold.
Heat olive oil in a pan, add shallots and carrots, when cook half through, add fish, cardamom, thyme and laurel, add wine. Cover and let cook until the fish is cooked and wine reduced.
For the sauce, mix white wine and stock and reduce, then add cream and reduce a little more.
For plating, divide dandelions at the bottom of a dish (I would use a hollow dish) then add rice, one mahi mahi filet on top, place carrots around. pour with sauce and one slice of candied lemon on top.
