Cooking with Rice

Rice is, of course, a very flexible staple. I use it as the foundation for both Mexican and Chinese dishes, as well as a few other meals.

Mexican:

• Mexican Haystacks: layer rice with any or all of the following: lettuce, chili, meat, beans, refried beans, cheese, sour cream, olives, salsa, tomatoes, green onions, cooked corn .... any of your favorite toppings. Crumble chips on the top or eat like a dip.
• Combine instant rice (however many servings you want), water needed for rice (less any liquid from tomatoes, if you decide to use them), tomatoes, canned corn (drained) (or thawed frozen corn), kidney/black/red beans (drained and rinsed), olives, taco seasoning. Cover and simmer until rice is tender. Add cheddar cheese and stir until melted. Serve as a casserole, over chips, or as a filling for tortillas. If you don't use instant rice, cook rice first and add other ingredients to rice.
• Fajitas -- I use fresh or frozen peppers (frozen blends sometimes come seasoned; if not, I love lemon pepper, and you can buy Mexican seasoning packets/envelopes), stir fry them with meats (or not) and serve with rice and the fixin's (cheese, sour cream, ...any of your favorite Mexican toppings)
  

Chinese

• Fried rice: Scramble eggs with soy sauce in 2 T. oil. Add cooked rice and more soy sauce as desired. Add any meat or veggies and heat.
  
• I love buying frozen veggie packages that have oriental vegetables in them, with or without seasoning. (They are cheaper without.) I buy envelopes of different oriental seasonings and put them with the veggies and serve over rice. I will sometimes add meat as well. (So, you could make beef and broccoli, sweet and sour chicken/beef, chow mein, etc.)
• Cashew chicken – In a saucepan, combine 1-2 cans cream of chicken soup, 1-2 cups chicken broth (or milk or a can of condensed milk), 1-2 cups chicken, 1-2 cups mixed vegetables (thawed) and 1-2 cups cashews. Bring to a near boil, then reduce heat and simmer about 10-15 minutes. Serve over rice.

Other meal ideas that use rice:

• Hawaiian Haystacks: Layer cooked rice, hot cream of chicken soup, cooked chicken, pineapple, peas, onions, dry chinese noodles, cheddar cheese, raisins, tomatoes, mandarine oranges…may sound a little weird if you haven’t tried before, but they are SO good!
• Chicken casserole: To cooked rice, add cream of chicken soup, canned broth, cooked chicken, and your favorite frozen veggies (or you can serve them on the side). Top with cheese, if desired. (This can all be done in one pan on the stove.) Or make sauce separately and put over rice.
  
• Beef and rice: To cooked rice, add cream of mushroom soup, ground beef or beef chunks, sour cream or cream cheese if desired, and veggies (carrots or peas and carrots would be good). Or make sauce separately and put over rice.
  
• Tuna casserole: To cooked rice, add 2 cans drained tuna, a can of cream of mushroom or chicken soup (and milk to get desired consistency). Add or top with your favorite cheese. (Or make the sauce separate and put over rice with cheese and other toppings as options.)
• Various homemade soups can use rice as well (chicken and rice, veggie and rice, beef and rice).
  

What are your favorite rice recipes?

Cooking with Pasta

Following are some different ways that I like to prepare pasta:

• Our favorite pasta sauces are the usual jarred red sauce, pesto sauce (I buy seasoning envelopes on sale, puree with spinach and/or broccoli), and alfredo sauce (again, I get these in envelope mixes for really cheap). Sometimes we will have a pasta bar to choose and mix sauces. Yum.
• Angel Hair with olive oil, basil, oregano and parmesan cheese. Also good tossed with veggies or tomatoes.
• Lasagna casserole in a pan: To 16 oz. cooked pasta, add a jar of your favorite tomato-based pasta sauce, mixed with 16 oz. cottage cheese and about 1-2 cups mozzarella (lasagna in a pan!). If you don’t have cottage cheese, then just mozzarella works well, as does cheddar, or any of the above with some parmesan. Spinach and/or chicken (or ground beef, of course) add a nice touch to this combination. Broccoli would be good, too.
• Pasta with a white sauce and veggies and parmesan cheese.
  
• Quick homemade mac-n-cheese (one of my kids' favorites!)– simply cook a pound or so of pasta, and slowly stir in a can of evaporated milk and a cup or two of cheddar cheese. (You can also make a white sauce, but this is SO much easier, and still tastes good!) Be sure to stir until the sauce thickens. To this, you can add ham, veggies (peas are really good)…you could even get creative and make a chili mac casserole or some other Mexican creation….
• Pasta with browned butter (real butter, not margarine) and shredded parmesan (not the canned kind)…a Spaghetti Factory wanna-be meal that tastes SO good!)
• Tuna casserole – SO easy…just add 1-2 cans tuna and 1 can cream of chicken or mushroom to a pound of pasta. I sometimes toss in a handful or two of mozzarella, and/or some parmesan (cheddar would work, too). There’s no need to cook in the oven, unless you want a crust on the top (bread crumbs with butter and/or parmesan would make nice toppings).
• Easy lasagna – Spray 9X13 with vegetable spray. Put a thin layer of pasta sauce on the bottom of your pan, then layer as usual (noodles (they make no-cook lasagna noodles now, but you can use regular ones and just cook longer), sauce, cottage and/or ricotta cheese (not necessary...I rarely have this on hand, so I rarely use it), mozzarella…and you can add meat or spinach or broccoli to the sauce). The trick with this recipe is that you use UNCOOKED noodles, and then add about 1 to 1½ cups water for every 8 oz. of lasagna noodles. I usually use the jar for the pasta sauce, and do about a half jar full of water (experiment with this). Cover with foil and bake at 350º-375º (less than an hour for no-cook noodles, one hour to an hour and half for the others). Just keep your eye on it…I’ve added more water sometimes and at other times, I’ve taken the foil off to let some of the water evaporate if it seems a little soupy. My husband loves this recipe! (If you don’t want to use commercial sauce, I’ve never found a lasagna sauce I like better than this one: 6 oz. tomato paste, 2½ cups tomatoes, 1 t. salt, ½ t. pepper, ¼ t. oregano, 2 t. sugar. You can add a pound of ground beef that has been cooked with garlic cloves, if desired. Cook and simmer 20 minutes. You can double or triple this recipe and freeze it for future use!)
• Stroganoff: cooked ground beef (I get it in a can from the cannery), 1 can cream of mushroom soup, and 1 c. sour cream (or cream cheese, or plain yogurt) simmered together and served over egg noodles.