Flashback Friday - Saffron Rice and Beans

This post originally appeared on Minxeats.com on December 4, 2012.

Here's another quick weekday recipe from Mr. Minx.

Probably half of the dinners I cook during the week are pieced together from leftovers. One of the things I always hated as a kid was when my mother would serve reheated leftovers in the same form as they were served originally. Nine times out of ten, the meal was a pale imitation of the original, so I always prefer to reinvent the leftovers into some other type of dish. Besides, there's almost never enough food left over to serve exactly the same way. Case in point, a meal I put together the other day.

When I opened the fridge, our leftover inventory consisted of a container of steamed rice, some tomato sauce, and four thin slices of pot roast that Minx had ordered at our favorite diner a few nights earlier. My usual plan when I'm confronted with rice is to do a Chinese-style fried rice dish, but we had eaten Chinese food the night before, so I thought about other cuisines that use rice. That's when paella popped into my head.

Of course, paella is way too complicated, and I didn't have all the ingredients for it anyway, but I thought by adding saffron to the rice, I could build on the paella inspiration. Digging through the pantry, I found a can of black beans and, in the freezer, our usual stash of frozen peas. Rice and beans are a classic, and saffron rice tastes great, so this could actually work. Cooked all together with onions and garlic, the dish was homey and comforting, while having a touch of the exotic thanks to the saffron. I sprinkled the chopped pot roast into the dish for meaty goodness, but the recipe below excludes the pot roast because a) not everyone will have leftover pot roast in the fridge; and b) the recipe works great as a vegetarian dish.

Saffron Rice and Beans

2 cups cooked rice
1 medium onion chopped
2 cloves garlic, finely chopped
1 teaspoon of olive oil
1 teaspoon of butter
A few strands of saffron bloomed in 1/2 cup of warm water
1/2 teaspoon fresh oregano, chopped
15 oz. can black beans
4 oz. tomato puree or tomato sauce
1/2 cup frozen petite peas
salt and pepper to taste
Cilantro and scallion for garnish

Place a few strands of saffron in 1/2 cup of water to "bloom," or turn the water into a nice yellow color. While that's going on, open a can of black beans, dump them in a colander, and rinse the starch off under running water. With that prep work done, chop a medium onion and saute it in a pan with olive oil and melted butter. Once the onions are translucent, dump in the cooked rice and mix together. Add your garlic and the saffron water. Mix everything together well so that the rice takes on a yellow color. Add the tomato puree, and then add the black beans and the petite peas. Once everything is incorporated and heated through, season with salt, pepper, and the fresh oregano. Once on the plate, sprinkle some cilantro and chopped scallion on top for garnish.

Rasgulla

I'm not into the whole idea that one simply eats to live, because I live to eat. That has made me an adventurous cook. While I love meatloaf and spaghetti and meatballs as much as the next person, I almost never cook them. (Besides, Neal does a much better job at both dishes than I do.) I prefer to make things that are a little more unusual than what one would expect a second generation Polish-American to make: octopus; egg foo yung; b'stilla; rasgulla.

Rasgulla is an Indian dessert, basically cheese balls cooked in a sweet syrup. I found the recipe in Chetna Makan's book The Cardamom Trail. Chetna was a contestant on the 2014 season of the Great British Bake-Off and an even more recent Christmas special. Trained as a fashion designer in Mumbai, she moved to the UK a decade or so ago where she honed her already keen talent for baking. She's known for incorporating exotic spices and international flavors into her bakes, and her creativity quickly made her my favorite contestant of the four seasons of the Bake-Off that I've seen so far. I purchased her book as a Christmas gift to myself but so far haven't made anything other than the rasgulla. Why? Because most of the recipes call for self-raising flour, and I've been too lazy to look up the conversion to regular AP flour. Plus, the house has been full of holiday baked goods and food show samples and there hasn't been room for one more pie or cake or cookie in our already oversized bellies. That said, I'm hoping to try something before it gets too warm to turn on the oven.

In the meantime, however, I did find time to make these cheese balls. No self-raising flour required, and they sounded pretty simple otherwise. They're rather unusual, in that the cheese becomes very firm and "squeaky" after cooking. I find them most pleasing when warm, but they can also be eaten at room temperature or chilled.

Rasgulla (adapted from The Cardamom Trail)

1-2 tablespoons lime juice
1 3/4 pints whole milk
Pinch saffron
1 cup sugar
2 teaspoons rosewater
1 tablespoon cornstarch

Mix 1 tablespoon of lime juice with 1 tablespoon of water in a bowl and set aside. Bring the milk to a boil in a large saucepan, then turn off the heat. Add the saffron. Pour in the lime juice and stir well. Let stand for 5 minutes - the milk should curdle. If it hasn't curdled enough, add the other tablespoon of lime juice and wait a few more minutes until there's a definite separation of the curds and whey.

Place a layer of cheesecloth in a fine gauge strainer and place over a bowl. Carefully pour the curdled milk into the strainer, catching the curds in the cheesecloth and allowing the whey to drain into the bowl. Gather the ends of the cloth together and wring out as much liquid from the curds as you can. Drain the whey from the bowl, set the strainer back on top, and place the bundle of squeezed curds back in. Place a small plate on top and weight it down with a can or two to help press out any excess liquid. Allow to drain for 15 minutes.

In a wide pan, heat the sugar with three cups of water until the sugar has dissolved. Remove the syrup from the heat.

Remove the curd from the cloth. Place it on a clean surface, sprinkle with the cornstarch, and knead with your palms for 10 minutes. It will go from crumbly to soft and smooth. Roll the dough into a fat log and cut into 20 pieces. Roll each piece into a smooth ball.

Once the balls are ready, bring the syrup to a boil and add the rosewater. Add the balls, then cover the pan and cook over medium heat for 15 minutes. The rasgulla will double in size and become spongy. Turn off the heat and keep the balls in the syrup until ready to serve.

Serve warm with or chilled with some of the syrup. Leftovers can be stored in the syrup in an airtight container for up to three days.



Posted on Minxeats.com.

Safffron Rice and Beans

Here's another quick weekday recipe from Mr. Minx.

Probably half of the dinners I cook during the week are pieced together from leftovers. One of the things I always hated as a kid was when my mother would serve reheated leftovers in the same form as they were served originally. Nine times out of ten, the meal was a pale imitation of the original, so I always prefer to reinvent the leftovers into some other type of dish. Besides, there's almost never enough food left over to serve exactly the same way. Case in point, a meal I put together the other day.

When I opened the fridge, our leftover inventory consisted of a container of steamed rice, some tomato sauce, and four thin slices of pot roast that Minx had ordered at our favorite diner a few nights earlier. My usual plan when I'm confronted with rice is to do a Chinese-style fried rice dish, but we had eaten Chinese food the night before, so I thought about other cuisines that use rice. That's when paella popped into my head.

Of course, paella is way too complicated, and I didn't have all the ingredients for it anyway, but I thought by adding saffron to the rice, I could build on the paella inspiration. Digging through the pantry, I found a can of black beans and, in the freezer, our usual stash of frozen peas. Rice and beans are a classic, and saffron rice tastes great, so this could actually work. Cooked all together with onions and garlic, the dish was homey and comforting, while having a touch of the exotic thanks to the saffron. I sprinkled the chopped pot roast into the dish for meaty goodness, but the recipe below excludes the pot roast because a) not everyone will have leftover pot roast in the fridge; and b) the recipe works great as a vegetarian dish.

Saffron Rice and Beans

2 cups cooked rice
1 medium onion chopped
2 cloves garlic, finely chopped
1 teaspoon of olive oil
1 teaspoon of butter
a few strands of saffron bloomed in 1/2 cup of warm water
1/2 teaspoon fresh oregano, chopped
15 oz. can black beans
4 oz. tomato puree or tomato sauce
1/2 cup frozen petite peas
salt and pepper to taste
cilantro and scallion for garnish

Place a few strands of saffron in 1/2 cup of water to "bloom," or turn the water into a nice yellow color. While that's going on, open a can of black beans, dump them in a colander, and rinse the starch off under running water. With that prep work done, chop a medium onion and saute it in a pan with olive oil and melted butter. Once the onions are translucent, dump in the cooked rice and mix together. Add your garlic and the saffron water. Mix everything together well so that the rice takes on a yellow color. Add the tomato puree, and then add the black beans and the petite peas. Once everything is incorporated and heated through, season with salt, pepper, and the fresh oregano. Once on the plate, sprinkle some cilantro and chopped scallion on top for garnish.

Posted on Minxeats.com.