My go-to Mexican rice recipe of late has been Cook's Illustrated Mexican Rice. The recipe produces unfailing delicious Mexican red rice – flavorful and great texture. However, it creates a preparation challenge for me in that it requires cooking the rice in the oven after toasting the rice and adding the seasonings on the stovetop.
That oven step adds more complexity in that you need to not only pre-heat an oven and cook it longer than it would take on the stovetop, but also it takes up your oven when you may need to preparing other items like vegetables or enchiladas. So I'd love to find a stovetop-only good Mexican Rice recipe, but unfortunately my prior experiences trying to find such a recipe have failed.
Enter Pati Jinich, my new favorite Mexican cuisine TV chef (sorry Rick Bayless!). Pati has such amazing energy and pride for her food in her show, and I've made some of her great recipes in the past. On a whim, I tried her Arroz Rojo recipe from her Pati's Mexican Table book to complement some drunken beans and homemade tortillas one weeknight.
The rice was fantastic – incredibly flavorful from the pureed onion, garlic, chile, and parsley (I may have subbed cilantro though), and nice texture from the added corn, carrot, and peas. And the stove-top only prep made it a perfect side dish that didn't take up too much time (or oven space or time) from other dishes.
To start, saute the rinsed and drained rice with oil until slightly translucent.
Then add the pureed tomatoes, onion, garlic and salt mixture.
Cook down for a few minutes, and then add the broth and vegetables. Cover when it reaches a boil, and simmer until cooked to your taste.
Then let the rice sit covered for five minutes off heat, then fluff and serve. Yum!
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