Persian Rice Recipe

Rice Prep:

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-Prepare your rice by placing it in a large bowl. Fill up the bowl with clean water

-Add 4 TBSP of salt to your bowl and give everything a good mix

-Let the rice soak for 2 hours in the salt water

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Par-Boiling Rice:

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-Grab a 3 QT pot (non-stick if you have it, but stainless steel is great too), preferably wide, and fill it up with water, bring it to a boil, (and bring a strainer nearby)

-Once the pot is boiling, right away drain your soaking rice, get as much excess water out as possible (wait until the water is boiling before you drain your rice)

-Gently add your rice to the boiling water and stir, bring the water back to a boil

-We are just par-boiling the rice, so we want to see the rice floating to the top and dancing around, the actual grain of rice should be "al-dente" meaning you should be able to see a white dot in the middle of the grain and experience some resistance when breaking the grain in half.

-When you reach "al-dente" rice, drain it and rinse it right away! Rinsing the rice after par-boiling it will stop the cooking process so we can complete it during the steaming step and removes \ the remaining excess starch (this will keep your rice from becoming mushy), let the rice continue draining while we prepare the rest of the ingredients.

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Preparing your Ingredients:

 

-Wash your pot and dry it completely

-Grab 2 medium potatoes, peel and wash them

-Slice the potatoes into half inch slices (you want them thin, they don't need to be perfect) and place them in a bowl to the side (the reason I wait to slice the potatoes until after the rice is par-boiled is to they don't oxidize and turn brown)

-Bring your rice, salt and oil close by.

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Steaming the Rice:

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-Place your pot on medium heat, add your butter/shortening/margarine and bring to heat

-Add your potatoes to the pot, we want a single layer of potato, but we also want to cover any gaps in between the potato slices that would expose the bottom of the pot, so if some potato slices overlap it is totally ok! 

-Now, grab the par-boiled and drained rice, place it gently over the layer of potatoes at the bottom of your pot, use a spoon or spatula (I prefer a wooden spoon) to form a slope with the rice, it should look like a mountain of rice over the layer of potatoes

-Flip your spoon upside down and use the handle to form holes through your mountain of rice down to the potatoes, the holes will allow the steam to distribute throughout all the rice and achieve an even steam for the rice

-Cover your pot and place a towel over it.

-Lower your fire, you want a very low flame, but a strong enough flame to keep frying the potatoes, so medium low but closer to low if that makes sense. (What's essentially happening is the potatoes are frying, which releases steam, which in turn steams the rice, the potatoes also act as a platform for the rice to sit on 

-Let the rice steam for 15 minutes, DO NOT open that pot, trust it to do its thing

-After 15 minutes, remove the cover, taste for seasoning, if its missing salt, now is the time to add it, if you are adding salt make sure to mix it in, bring the rice back to a slope, and remake the holes

-Now we will add the 1/4 cup of oil to the rice, pour the oil over all the rice and mix it in well, bring the rice back to a slope and make holes again.

-Cover the pot again and let steam an additional 10-15 minutes on the same low fire.

This is where you want to be a bit more careful as the potatoes can burn, so stay close and

monitor the rice, if you think the potatoes are done or they might burn remove the pot from

the fire because the last thing you want is burned rice, trust me. But not to worry, if you follow the instructions nothing should burn!

-Once the rice is done steaming, remove it from the fire, the rice should be grain by grain separated, not mushy at all and fully cooked.

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Serving the Rice:

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-Grab any serving tray or pan you want, and gently remove the rice from the pot making sure not to scrape the potatoes along with it.

-Then grab a spatula and slowly and gently remove the crispy potatoes from the bottom of the pot and place them crispy side up over the rice

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That's it! if you did everything right then you are probably super proud of yourself right now and rightly so!!

(if it didn't work :( keep trying, it might take a few mistakes before you master this)

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Enjoy!

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chef-ish?

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