Dinner continued...

Around comes dinner time, while my lovely steaks i showed you all this morning have been cooking away in the crock pot all day, I have managed to get bunches of things done for our Halloween Potluck tomorrow. We're finally sitting down to eat and i still have tons to do.... imagine that. I whipped up some Oreo balls as well...i'll save those for my post from the pot luck :)

On with the puerto rican theme; we are having white rice....NOT cooked in a rice maker, and beans with buttercup squash. This is my absolute favorite meal...ever. Any time i go home to visit i manage to request this meal, to every puerto rican family member i have. I have a lot of family...Rice and beans are a staple in puerto rico and if you asked my dad its probably the only necessary food in his eyes. I have never owned a rice cooker and actually growing up my mom didnt either so stove top rice is all ive ever known, although it might seem scary it really is quite easy and i'll show you how to get perfect rice EVERY TIME I cook my rice in an aluminum pot, we call it a "caldero" but you can use any medium sized sauce pot.

  You'll also notice that i have a pretty big variety of spices i use for my beans... take note, because like i said in hispanic cooking they will come up again in a future recipe. All of my seasonings can be found at the commissary for my military friends and for my non military friends MOST not all but MOST walmarts carry the stuff.

Here goes..

Perfect White Rice

 

Ingredients:

2 cups Short or medium grain white rice

3 tbsp olive oil

2tbsp kosher salt

2.5 cups of water

 

 

Directions:

1.       In a medium pot, heat up oil on medium high heat.

2.       Add rice, and mix until oil evenly coats the rice

3.       Constantly stirring, let the rice “pre cook” for 2 min just until some grains look a little toasted

4.       Add water and salt, stir

5.       Let the rice cook on medium high heat until water is almost gone and you can see holes breaking the surface of the rice ( don’t worry theres pictures)

6.       Now cover the rice turn on low and don’t touch it for 20 minutes

7.       After 20 mins open the rice and stir twice just to flip the rice around. Take a taste and if it is still a little too firm cover and leave for another 10 minutes. Check again, take off heat and leave the top off

rice and oil

after adding water

"holes" in the rice

 water is almost all gone, this is when you cover it

finished product!!

 

 

 

 

 

Puerto Rican Beans

Ingredients:

1 can of red kidney beans or pink beans
2 cups cubed Buttercup squash
1 tbsp Tomato Paste
2 tbsp Sofrito
1 tsp crushed garlic
2 packets Sazon seasoning
1 packet Ham bullion
2 tbsp chicken bullion
¼ cup sugar
1 can of water

 

Directions

1.       In a small sauce pot….dump everything in.

2.       Let it simmer on medium heat for 15 minutes

3.       Lower heat and allow to cook until squash is tender and sauce has thickened

 all dumped in

nice and thick :)

 

 

 

 

MMMMM so delicious!