Rice and Grain Recipes & Ideas

Garlic paste is one of those things that we hardly ever think of making ourselves. It comes from a jar, right?!Homemade garlic paste is really just one step beyond mincing, and the results are indisputably fresher and of better quality.Want to give it a whirl? Read on!First, mince the garlic as finely as possible.

Many cocktail recipes for the spring and summer call for the addition of simple syrup. Even better is when the recipe calls for a flavored simple syrup, such as rosemary. This recipe is very easy to make, and your kitchen will smell so good while you’re making it. This is taken from the May 2007 issue of Southern Living magazine. Ingredients 1 cup sugar 1 cup water 4 fresh rosemary sprigs Preparation Stir together first 3 ingredients in a medium saucepan over medium-high heat.

After two weeks away from our kitchen, we returned last week to find the market positively brimming with spring vegetables. When we’d left there were only the first signs of ramps, but now there was an abundance of asparagus, rhubarb, peas in the shell, and even fiddlehead ferns.After filling our basket, we quickly started dreaming of recipes that would show off our bounty to its best, especially those rare fiddleheads.

We mentioned on Friday that we were planning on cooking this recipe from Epicurious: Chinese Broccoli With Sausage And Polenta. We made this on Saturday and we and our dinner companion were quite enraptured.It’s a very basic and easy one-bowl meal, though, and we were surprised at how quickly it came together. You just cook polenta, stirring occasionally, then fry up some smoked, spicy sausage and some bitter greens and pile them on top of the deliciously creamy polenta.

Remember this salad we posted yesterday as an option for using up frozen edamame? Well, we made it last night with our own half-full bag, plus some pantry staples. It was easy and really tasty.The recipe calls for canned black beans and black-eyed peas. We had never bought canned black-eyed peas, but there were no frozen at the store and we didn’t have time to cook dry ones, so we caved (but bought organic).

We couldn’t help but notice this beautiful photo of thin-sliced radishes on buttered bread in the April issue of Bon Appétit, since it reminded us of a favorite snack we’ve shared with you before.More below from the issue, including some great vegetarian dishes and healthy pantry staples (Cure takers, take note)…The article has 16 recipes: four for asparagus, four for artichokes, four for carrots, and four for greens.

Thanks to the peek inside Devesh and Tara’s Spice Pantry, we’ve got seeds on the brain. One we’ve been loving lately: whole cumin. Toasting the seeds is easy, and they add a complex texture and flavor you can’t get from ground cumin.

Pilaf makes a quick and elegant side dish to almost any meal. You can buy pilaf mixes at the grocery store, but we think it’s just as easy–or easier–to make it yourself and then fancy it up with whatever veggies and seasonings you like!The basic method for pilaf is not all that different from making regular rice. The main difference is that when you make pilaf, you saute the grains of rice before adding the liquid.

Our friend Michael of Herbivoracious (and of that splendid spicy chickpea stew) tells us, to our surprise, that bacon salt is both vegetarian and vegan! To demonstrate, he makes a vegan Farro with Collard Greens and Bacon Salt.More thoughts below…Like Michael we try to avoid artificial seasonings, but if any of you are going vegan for the New Year (permanently or temporarily) and need a way to ease off that meaty diet of the holidays, this might be helpful.

Trader Joe’s Harvest Grain BlendAdd a little shredded chicken or crumbled sausage for a hearty one-dish meal; substitute vegetable broth to make it vegan. It’s an utterly flexible dish, and we’re going to the kitchen to eat our leftovers now!

Ginger, brown rice, scallions and parsley made up this last cupboard challenge, and fried rice seemed like a perfect solution. It turned out to be much more than a solution – it was a totally yummy dinner that provided several days of delicious lunches too. The rice is very gingery – sweet and spicy at the same time, and the onions and parsley provide just the right flavor to accompany sliced roasted pork tenderloin. Easy and fast, too!

Risottos and braises are not the same, since a risotto is not covered at any point in the cooking process. But they are related in that the rice is fried with butter at the beginning, then cooked slowly in liquid. Well, they’re close enough anyway to make us feel that this deliciously warm, chewy and gooey caramel risotto is in keeping with our theme this week.This is a simple but heavenly dish, requiring just a little milk, some sugar and rice, and a lot of stirring.