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Posts Tagged ‘Brown Rice’

Black Beans and Rice with Jammy Peppers

Posted in Food, Vegan, Vegetarian, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on 11 April 2023| 4 Comments »

This is a big dish and enough to serve on it’s own. It also goes well with this spicy chicken dish as helpfully suggested by Noor and Yotam, the authors of the Ottolenghi Test Kitchen Extra Good Things, where the recipe comes from.

Black beans and rice with jammy peppers – serves 6

  • 1 onion, finely chopped
  • 6 cloves of garlic, crushed
  • 2 tsp cumin seeds, finely crushed with a pestle and mortar
  • 2 tsp coriander seeds, finely crushed with a pestle and mortar
  • 1 tsp paprika
  • 1 tsp dried oregano
  • 300g short-grain brown rice, washed and soaked for 30 minutes, then drained
  • 2 x 400g tins of black beans, drained and rinsed
  • 20g fresh coriander, roughly chopped
  • 2 tbsp lime juice
  • 1 lime, cut into wedges, to serve
  • 2 medium avocados, cut into cubes

FOR THE PEPPERS:

  • 75ml olive oil
  • 2 onions, thinly sliced
  • 2 red peppers, trimmed and cut into 1cm thick strips
  • 4 cloves of garlic, crushed
  • 1½ tbsp tomato purée
  • 2 tsp light soft brown sugar
  • 1 tsp dried oregano
  • 1 tsp chipotle chilli flakes
  • 2 tbsp apple cider vinegar

Make the peppers first by putting the oil into a medium sauté pan over a medium-high heat. Add the onions and cook for 4 minutes, to soften. Add the peppers and ½ tsp of salt and cook for another 6 minutes, until softened and starting to colour. Turn the heat down to medium-low and stir in the garlic, tomato purée, sugar, oregano, chipotle, vinegar, 2 tbsp of water and plenty of black pepper. Cover with a lid and cook for half an hour, stirring now and then, until soft. Set aside.

Meanwhile, make the rice. Put 4 tbsp of the oil in a large saucepan and place over a medium-high heat. Add the onion and cook for 5 minutes, until softened and starting to colour. Add the garlic, spices and oregano and cook for a minute, until fragrant. Stir through the rice to coat, then add the black beans, 520ml of water, 1¼ tsp of salt and lots of black pepper. Bring to the boil, then reduce the heat to low and leave to cook, covered for 50 minutes. Remove the lid and set aside for 10 minutes to cool slightly.

Meanwhile, blitz the coriander, lime juice and 2 tbsp of oil in a mini food processor until smooth. Transfer to a bowl and stir in the avocado and ¼ tsp of salt.

Transfer the rice and beans to a large platter and spoon over the peppers and avocado. Serve with the lime wedges.

(Original recipe from Ottolenghi Test Kitchen Extra Good Things by Noor Murad & Yotam Ottolenghi, Ebury Press, 2022.)

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Smoky Butter Beans & Greens

Posted in Food, Gluten-free, Vegetarian, tagged , , , , , , , , on 7 May 2020| 2 Comments »

Smoky Butter Beans & Greens

We’re eating our way through lockdown but still making a vague attempt at keeping healthy on weekdays. This approach has been slightly more successful this week than others! We used some leftover chard for this but spring greens would also be good and it’s pretty much store-cupboard stuff after that.

Wine Suggestion: given the mild nature of this dish it weirdly works with Prosecco Rosé made from the Raboso grape. Raboso can be fierce and awkward, especially made as a red wine, but the light extraction of colour and addition of residual sugar in Prosecco can (but not always) make a charming, food friendly wine; choosing a good producer is suggested.

Smoky butter beans & greens – serves 4

  • 200g brown rice
  • 3 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
  • 200g spring greens or chard, roughly chopped (if using chard, cut out the stalks and chop into short lengths, then roughly chop the leaves)
  • 3 garlic cloves, finely sliced
  • 400g tin butter beans, rinsed and drained
  • ½ tsp cumin seeds
  • 1 tsp smoked paprika
  • natural yoghurt, to serve

Rinse and cook the rice. We use a rice cooker but you can cook in a pot according to the pack instructions or cook in salty boiling water for 20-25 minutes, then drain.

Heat 2 tbsp of the olive oil in a large, deep frying pan with a lid. Add the greens, season with plenty of salt and pepper, then cover and cook for 4 to 5 minutes, stirring now and then, until wilted (if you are using chard, add the stalks first and cook for a few minutes before adding the leaves).

Add the garlic and cook without the lid for a few minutes, stirring. Add the butterbeans and stir until heated through, then add another tbsp of olive oil, the cumin seeds  and the smoked paprika. Stir to combine and allow the flavours to come together, then serve over the rice with some natural yoghurt.

(Original recipe by Celia Brooks Brown in BBC Good Food Magazine, May 2010.)

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Chicken, date & lentil pilaf with saffron butter

Posted in Cheese, Food, tagged , , , , , , , , on 25 April 2016| 2 Comments »

Chicken, date & lentil pilaf with saffron butter

This tasted luxurious and refreshing with the saffron butter and orange, top notch treatment for your leftover roast chicken!

Wine Suggestion: This called for an Alsace Pinot Gris, well more specifically the Bott-Geyl Pinot d’Alsace “Metiss” which is actually a blend of all the Pinot’s you can think of plus Pinot Noir to form a layered and textured wine with lovely freshness and hints of spice that brought out the saffron and orange flavours. Bott-Geyl are a brilliant, biodynamic producer and I think each vintage they build upon the past and deliver even more. This bottle we had lying in our cellar, so they age nicely for a few years, if you can resist, but don’t worry, they taste just as good fresh and young.

Chicken, date & lentil brown rice pilaf with saffron butter – serves 6

  • 15g unsalted butter, plus an additional 30g for the saffron butter
  • 1 onion, finely chopped
  • 2 garlic cloves, finely chopped
  • 300g brown basmati rice, washed until the water runs clear
  • 700ml chicken stock
  • 12 dates, pitted and sliced thinly, lengthways
  • finely grated zest of 1 orange and juice of ½
  • 200g Puy lentils, rinsed
  • good squeeze of lemon juice
  • 1 tbsp lemon juice
  • 350g cooked chicken, torn in to pieces
  • 25g chopped, unsalted pistachios or toasted flaked almonds
  • 4 tbsp roughly chopped coriander leaves
  • generous pinch of saffron strands
  • 300g Greek yoghurt

Heat the 15g of butter in a heavy-based saucepan and sauté the onion until soft and lightly coloured. Add the garlic and continue to cook for another couple of minutes. Add the rice and stir until well coated with the butter and starting to toast. Add the chicken stock, dates, and orange zest and bring to the boil. Reduce the heat, cover and cook for about 30 minutes by which time the stock will have become absorbed. If it starts to look dry add a little boiling water.

Meanwhile, cook the lentils in lots of boiling water until tender. They can take between 15-30 minutes so keep checking to ensure they don’t turn to mush. When cooked, drain and rinse in hot water and add to the rice. Fork through, season with salt and pepper and a good squeeze of lemon juice.

Heat the olive oil in a frying pan and quickly reheat the cooked chicken, then season. Gently fork through the rice and lentils along with the nuts, coriander and orange juice. Taste again for seasoning.

Quickly make the saffron butter by melting the 30g butter in a pan, add the saffron and stir so the butter takes on the colour.

Put the rice on a serving platter, spoon on some yoghurt,  pour on the saffron butter and serve.

(Original recipe from A Bird in the Hand by Diana Henry, Mitchell Beazley, 2015.)

 

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Baked Brussels Sprouts in a Creamy Stilton Cheese sauce

Posted in Food, Vegetarian, tagged , , , , on 28 December 2011| Leave a Comment »

As this was our most viewed post over Christmas we thought we’d revisit this recipe. We really didn’t need much of an excuse as we’d enjoyed it so much the first time we’d cooked it, but it over-delivered. Yum! We’re also adding a great method for cooking brown rice as the two pair very well.

Plain brown rice – to serve 3-4

  • a 250ml measure of brown rice
  • 1/2 tsp salt

Put the rice, 475ml water and salt in a small, heavy-based pan with a tight-fitting lid (if the lid’s not tight just put a layer of tinfoil between the pot and the lid to keep the steam in) and bring to the boil. Cover tightly, turn the heat down to very, very low and cook for 45 minutes. This is easy to do if you have gas but harder with electric so we recommend using two rings so you can get the heat to low quickly.

Leave the pan off the heat, still covered with the lid, for 10 minutes before you serve it.

(Method by Madhur Jaffrey, Curry Easy, Ebury Press, 2010).

Wine suggestion: There’s a lot going on in this dish: cream, salty cheese, earthy Brussel Sprouts … you need some acidity to counter the richness and cream; a touch of sweetness, or round fruitiness to balance the salty Stilton; and an earthiness to compliment the lot. We drank a New Zealand Chardonnay which went well, but we think a Chardonnay from the Jura, a Sylvaner from Alsace or a very well made Aligote from Burgundy would work even better.

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