This recipe is not very different from most rice recipes except that it is baked.

That said, it sure is a tasty one and I think you should give it a try. It’s a great match with chicken or pork.

The Recipe
1 1/2 cups boiling chicken broth
1 tablespoon butter
3/4 cup long grain rice
1/4 cup chopped green onion
1/4 cup chopped celery
1/4 cup chopped carrot

In a 1-quart casserole, combine boiling chicken broth with the butter and stir until the butter is melted.

Stir in rice, green onion, celery, and carrots.

Cover and bake in a 350° oven for about 35 minutes or until tender and all liquid is absorbed. Fluff with a fork.

Serves 4.

Some variations on this recipe:
Use 1/2 rice and 1/2 barley
Add 1/4 cup chopped mushrooms
Add 1/4 cup of red, green, orange, or yellow pepper for a zing of color

Baked Macaroni and Cheese

Serves 6 to 8

Ingredients
1/2 pound elbow macaroni (you can use most any pasta though)
3 tablespoons butter
3 tablespoons flour
1 tablespoon powdered mustard
3 cups milk
1/2 cup yellow onion, finely diced
1 bay leaf
1/2 teaspoon paprika
1 large egg
12 ounces sharp cheddar, shredded
1 teaspoon kosher salt
Fresh black pepper

Topping:
3 tablespoons butter
1 cup panko bread crumbs

Directions
Preheat oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit.

Cook the macaroni according to the instructions on the package, make sure you salt the water.

As the macaroni cooks, take another pan and melt the butter. Use a whisk to combine in the flour and mustard, keep stirring for about 5 minutes. Yes, we’re making a roux here. It should be lump free. Then stir the milk in, add the onion, the bay leaf, and the paprika. Simmer the mixture for 10 minutes. Remove the bar leaf at the end of this time.

Quick lesson on roux:
Roux is a base sauce in international cuisines, originally French, composed of varying ratios of flour and fat (usually butter), useful for making sauces, and for thickening soups or gravies. The benefits of using a roux include: it does not have to be cooked very long to remove a floury taste, clumps of flour are removed, and it creates unique flavors. It can be cooked to different degrees:
white roux
blonde roux
brown roux
dark/brick roux
burnt roux
depending upon the intended use, and a darker roux (one that has been cooked longer) will also be thicker and have more flavor, but will have less thickening power.

Temper in the egg. Stir in 9 ounces of the shredded cheese. Salt and pepper the mixture. Slowly add the macaroni into the mix, stirring thoroughly, then pour into a 2-quart casserole dish. Top with remaining cheese.

If you don’t know what tempering is, here are the basics. Tempering is the process that cooks use to raise the temperature of something instead of just dumping it in. It is used for raising the temperature of such ingredients as milk, cream, eggs, etc.. To start the process, take a spoon or some other small measuring device and fill it with whatever hot liquid you are working with. Take it and stir it into your ingredient such as our milk, flour, and mustard mixture from above. Then get another spoonful and stir it in, Repeat the process until the target ingredient is brought up to temperature. In our case, until the egg is hot, but not cooked like a scrambled egg.

Melt the butter in a saute pan and toss the bread crumbs to coat. Top the macaroni with the bread crumbs. Bake for 30 minutes. Remove from oven and rest for five minutes before serving.

I have been known to stir in crumbled bacon into this dish. How much? Well, until it looks like there’s enough. muah

I’ve also grown to like more cheese on top of it. Use your own judgement. Don’t add too much as it can get a bit greasy. But some extra is a good thing.

Enjoy this one, it’s a keeper.

Similar to the meatloaf recipe, but with a little more pizazz.
This is for my pal YGFGF, hope you enjoy. (I promise pictures next time I make these.)

Serves 4
1 lb lean ground beef or turkey
1 lb Italian sausage
2 eggs
Breadcrumbs
Parmesan-Reggiano cheese
Fresh basil
Fresh flat leaf parsley
2-3 or more cloves of chopped garlic
1/2 a medium onion, chopped fine
Oregano to taste
Salt & Pepper to taste
7-8 oz. fresh mozzarella cheese (you can use slices but why oh why when you can make fresh yourself? Wha? You’re not making your own? Tsk tsk tsk.

Easy to Make

Put the meat in a bowl, add the eggs, cheese, basil, parsley, garlic, onion, oregano, salt & pepper.

Mix well, use your hands. Don’t be afraid, you did wash your hands thoroughly before starting, right? Of course you did!

If the mixture seems wet, add more cheese or breadcrumbs or both. The texture should be moist, but not wet.

Once mixed, you want to form the mixture into patties. And by patties, I mean really fat ones, like 1/2 pound burgers. After all, we’re going to stuff these with mozzarella cheese.

Form the patties, setting each aside on a plate.

Once they are all done, take a patty and stick your thumb deep into the center of the patty to form a nice place for cheese. Put about an ounce or so of fresh mozzarella into the thumb hole, and seal the cheese in.

Again, set each patty aside when done. I will typically make these ahead of time and store in the fridge until about 30 minutes before grilling time.

Grill until they are done to your liking. I recommend cooking them a little more than you normally would.

Why? Why Dave, why?

Ok, here’s why. First, you want to make sure the cheese is melted. No explanation needed on why that is important, not to this crowd at least.

Second, there is something, primal about the texture of a crunchy, fire grilled, mozzarella burger. You bite into it and get to the cheese?

I’d love to hear what you think, give this a try. I think you’ll find it to be a crowd favorite.

—
d a v e

OK, this isn’t close to an original. I’ve only cooked it once twice.

So why is it here? Because it’s good, easy, quick, and different.

Here’s the base recipe from Food Network:
Kheema: Indian Ground Beef with Peas (open in new window/tab)
Recipe courtesy Aarti Sequeira

Prep Time:5 min Cook Time:20 min
Level: Easy
Serves: 4 servings

Ingredients
3 tablespoons canola oil
1 medium onion, finely diced
4 cloves garlic, minced
1 (1-inch thumb) fresh ginger, peeled and minced
2 teaspoons ground coriander
1 teaspoon paprika
1/2 teaspoon store-bought or homemade garam masala, recipe follows
1/2 teaspoon ground cumin
1/2 teaspoon cayenne, optional
1 pound ground beef
2 medium tomatoes, chopped
Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper
1 cup shucked fresh English peas or 1/2 cup frozen peas, thawed
2 teaspoons malt vinegar or apple cider vinegar
1/4 cup chopped fresh cilantro, plus a few extra leaves for garnish
4 chapatis or pitas, warmed

Directions
In a large skillet, warm the oil over medium-high heat. Add the onions and cook until golden. Add the garlic and ginger, and saute for another minute. Stir in the coriander, paprika, garam masala, cumin and cayenne, if using and cook for 1 minute.

Add the beef, breaking up lumps with a spoon, and saute until the meat is no longer pink. Add the tomatoes, 1 cup of water and season with salt and pepper. Sprinkle in the fresh English peas. Stir well and simmer, partially covered, about 10 minutes or if using frozen peas, add them now, and cook another 5 minutes, partially covered.

Stir in the vinegar and chopped cilantro. Garnish with torn cilantro leaves and serve with warm chapatis or pita bread.

Aarti’s Hot (not heavy!) Homemade Garam Masala:
3 large cinnamon sticks (if you have the kind you get at Indian stores, it’s about 3 tablespoons of cinnamon bark bits)
3 tablespoons whole cloves
1/4 cup green cardamom pods, shelled, husks discarded (about 2 tablespoons of seeds)
4 large black cardamom pods, shelled, husks discarded (about 1 tablespoon of seeds), optional
Combine the cinnamon sticks, cloves, green cardamom seeds, black cardamom seeds, if using, in a spice grinder or coffee grinder and grind until fine. Store the spice mix in an airtight container away from direct sunlight. Yield: about 1/2 cup.

###

What I did was to prepare the garam masala first. Although I had most of the items on hand for it, there’s always something I don’t have. So I improvised a tad. I will be looking for green cardamom seeds in the near future. I didn’t have cinnamon sticks either so I used ground cinnamon. But taste-wise this substitution worked. And since I now have gram masala made up, I can get this dish together even faster. Score!

I followed the recipe to the letter. And I think it’s a great dish. Like my opening said, good, easy, quick, and different. It is all of these.

Some things I will try the next time I make this. And given the quick prep time, this won’t be long.
1) Use chicken stock instead of water – mostly about flavor here
2) Reduce the amount of water. A full cup seems to be too much, especially if your tomatoes are juicy. Trying 1/3 cup next time.
3) Using different meat. Many posters on Food Network said they’d used ground turkey, lamb, etc.. And these would definitely work. I also think tofu would be just great in this. If you do use ground beef, try browning it separately so you can drain unwanted fat.
4) One poster said they’d used corn instead of peas. I think it would be great with both.
5) Use more spice. Dave likes his kheema spicy.

I can’t think of any other things to try, and I’m not sure there really are many more out there. This is a great dish, almost perfect as written. So, how about some pictures of the process?

The raw spices in the grinder, ready to be crushed into Indian cuisine goodness!

The spices, ground and ready to use.

Onions, chopped but not overly fine. I like having some chunkiness to my dishes.

Into the pan they go, I like to start foods like onions on high heat to get them going quickly.

The onions starting to develop a nice brown color, and this was a sweet onion to start so think how this would taste.

I add the ginger and the minced garlic. I love the color of fresh ginger!

I put the meat in to brown, break it it up but again I like chunkiness so I left some pieces a little larger. Sprinkle the gram masala and other spices in with the meat as it is browning.

The meat browning nicely. If it hasn't already hit you, the aroma of this dish is gonna get you.

Add a cup of frozen green peas and stir in, love these colors.

Add 2 chopped fresh tomatoes and stir in with the other ingredients. Don't lie, this is starting to really smell good!

See the steam forming? Oh yeah... Stir the mixture to ensure the peas cook evenly.

When everything else is ready, stir in the chopped cilantro leaves. They'll be perfect with a scant minute of time on the stove.

Horrid lighting. DO NOT LET THIS PICTURE DETRACT YOU! Honest, it was great. Problem was, I couldn't wait to dig in so no time for a reshoot. I served the kheema over white rice with warmed pita bread.