Cilantro Rice

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Tonight I’m cooking up a Mexican themed dinner with my favorite easy “go to” meal of carnitas and refried beans. I prepped all the ingredients for the carnitas the night before and placed them in a pot in the fridge.

Then I let the slow cooker cook the pinto beans overnight so they would be ready when I woke up the next morning leaving very little work to finish the beans. I place my creamy refried beans in a casserole then topped it with cheese and put it in the fridge along with the carnitas.

All I had to do when I got home was place the pot of carnitas on the stove, bring it to a boil, lower the heat and let it cook itself until it was tender. Then heat up the oven to 300 degrees for about 30 – 40 minutes to reheat the beans and let the cheese melt.

My husband suggested that I cook up a batch of cilantro rice to go along with our dinner. It was easy enough considering I had the rest of my dinner ready. It seemed like a perfect match.

Cilantro rice is the perfect combination of a handful of ingredients that amazingly packs a lot of flavor in a simple rice dish. The addition of the fresh cilantro makes this rice dish come alive.

I use Italian stewed tomatoes because that is what I have, but any type of stewed tomatoes will work. I also stated that you could use 1 – 3 serano chiles. Mild (1), Med (2) HOT (3).

Tip: let the rice sit for the 10 – 15 minutes off the heat and all the rice will come out of the pot clean. If you skip this step the rice will stick to the bottom of the pot.

CILANTRO RICE
2 cups long grain rice, rinsed and drained
1 med. onion, chopped small
1 clove garlic, minced
1-3 large serano chile, minced
14 oz. can Italian stewed tomatoes, crushed
14 oz. can chicken broth or water
2 pinches kosher salt
1 pinch black pepper
½ bunch cilantro, rough chopped

Crush tomatoes by squeezing the large tomato pieces with your hand.

Sauté onions, garlic and serano chile in a pot over med low heat with about 1 – 2 Tbsp. canola oil until the onions are soft.

Add rice and mix around with the onions. Pour the tomatoes and chicken broth into the pot and bring to a boil. Season with kosher salt and black pepper; bring to a boil. Cover and lower heat to as low as it can go; cook for 15 – 20 minutes or until rice is tender. Remove from the heat and let sit for 10 – 15 minutes. Fluff; add cilantro, season with more salt if needed and mix.