Recipe #45: http://www.irun.ca/issues/article.php?id=210&intIssueID=13
Don't ask me what the "Dirty Rice" part means. I rinsed mine as directed. Is it dirty because the rice is brown instead of white? Bah, I'm so not Cajun-wise.
Well, I made almost this entire recipe while on the phone with a friend. Hats off to me for multi-tasking! Luckily, it wasn't a horribly complicated recipe or I probably would have messed it up somehow.
So, the alterations: I didn't use chicken liver (are you KIDDING me??), soy replacement (barf), ground pork or ground beef. I used ground chicken instead, because I can. It was more expensive than ground beef, but it's leaner so I thought I'd give it a try. I didn't have authentic big carrots to cut so I hacked up some baby carrots, roughly a handful. I used a tin of chopped tomatoes (you'll have lots of liquid at the end, fyi), and about 3 large handfuls of baby spinach because the grocery store didn't sell it in bags. I happend to choose chicken broth because it was where my hand landed in the cupboard, and I used a small dab of coriander from the squeeze tube because I couldn't find cilantro at the store and they both start with "C". I skipped the salt and pepper because I forgot about them (I was on the phone, remember?), and used olive oil to saute my vegetables.
I didn't adjust the amount of liquid I added to the recipe so my liquid hadn't quite evaporated/been absorbed as it was supposed to. After the 15 minutes of covered cooking, I still had lots of liquid left so I just turned the heat up a bit and left the lid off, stirring periodically until most of the remaining liquid had disappeared.
My version of this recipe is quite tasty. I have no idea how cilantro would have tasted instead of coriander, but I like what I made. Good thing since there's a lot of it and only me to eat it. The only thing I will mention is that the ground chicken looks a little white and pasty in the dish, in case that's something that might bother you. I'm sure ground beef would give a nice, darker contrast and perhaps a more favourable flavour? Try it and let me know :)
Don't ask me what the "Dirty Rice" part means. I rinsed mine as directed. Is it dirty because the rice is brown instead of white? Bah, I'm so not Cajun-wise.
Well, I made almost this entire recipe while on the phone with a friend. Hats off to me for multi-tasking! Luckily, it wasn't a horribly complicated recipe or I probably would have messed it up somehow.
So, the alterations: I didn't use chicken liver (are you KIDDING me??), soy replacement (barf), ground pork or ground beef. I used ground chicken instead, because I can. It was more expensive than ground beef, but it's leaner so I thought I'd give it a try. I didn't have authentic big carrots to cut so I hacked up some baby carrots, roughly a handful. I used a tin of chopped tomatoes (you'll have lots of liquid at the end, fyi), and about 3 large handfuls of baby spinach because the grocery store didn't sell it in bags. I happend to choose chicken broth because it was where my hand landed in the cupboard, and I used a small dab of coriander from the squeeze tube because I couldn't find cilantro at the store and they both start with "C". I skipped the salt and pepper because I forgot about them (I was on the phone, remember?), and used olive oil to saute my vegetables.
I didn't adjust the amount of liquid I added to the recipe so my liquid hadn't quite evaporated/been absorbed as it was supposed to. After the 15 minutes of covered cooking, I still had lots of liquid left so I just turned the heat up a bit and left the lid off, stirring periodically until most of the remaining liquid had disappeared.
My version of this recipe is quite tasty. I have no idea how cilantro would have tasted instead of coriander, but I like what I made. Good thing since there's a lot of it and only me to eat it. The only thing I will mention is that the ground chicken looks a little white and pasty in the dish, in case that's something that might bother you. I'm sure ground beef would give a nice, darker contrast and perhaps a more favourable flavour? Try it and let me know :)
Two things - dirty rice is a New Orleans treat, worth the drive. AND coriander is a warm spice and cilantro is a cold spice - it will change the profile.
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