Mexican themed seasoned rice with whatever I had on hand (half an onion, carrot, peas, black beans) etc.
Scratch made tortillas. I had a little time while the rice cooked so I made quesadillas to add a little more fat.
Cost per person $1.00
It’s easy for me to say as someone who grew up with mostly Italian cooking in the house but, damn, I never tire of rice and beans especially when they’re well done like in this photo. It looks tasty!
I grew up in an Italian kitchen but in former Mexican territory. So I’m all over the place when it comes to food.
I’ve been suggesting rice and beans to my wife for a while and every time she got that look on her face that said “why would you hurt me?”
While eating she said “what do you call this?” “Rice and beans.” “This is rice and beans? I had. No idea it could be tasty. This is amazing.”
Apparently here version of rice and beans growing up was rice and beans, not rice and beans. She is now a convert and believer in the power of rice and beans.
Maybe one day I’ll do an Italian version with some cannellini beans, short grain rice and Italian seasonings.
If you have stuff like Peas and Carrots, why not make biryani? Kinda same but better suited seasonins…
Peas in a quesadilla sounds wack, though possibly maybe tasty.
My friend. Brother. Fellow lemming.
I have put just about everything you can think of between tortillas with cheese. If it’s been left over in my fridge, it has been quesodilla’d.
Chinese? Weirdly ok. Fried rice worked well, cashew chicken did not. Singapore style noodles were dope.
Jumbalaya was among my favorite, so much so that I routinely get andouille from a local butcher and make some Cajun chicken and shrimp to throw in there.
All this to say, Shepard’s pie was the worst thing I ever put on a tortilla with cheese. Cannot recommend.
However chicken pot pie filling, that is, leftover filling for a chicken pot pie, 3 fire emojis. So good. Almost like having the pie.
One of my wife’s favorites is smoked brie with grapes, candied walnuts, sliced grapes and raspberry compote with balsamic glaze drizzled on top. Needless to say I never have all that on hand at once so it never happens.
Swap the tortilla for Puff pastry and that’s fine eating.
If you know any tricks for making puff pastry from scratch in under 45 minutes I am interested in trying them out.
My trick is this: it’s in the freezer section at my local grocer. Get the one with the fewest ingredients. If you have a local bakery that’s cool they may sell you some of theirs.
I’ve made it before. I love baking and have made many manner of pastry. Just buy it. It’s so much work and I have never found the effort to be worth it.
The budget just isn’t there. Although if I’m buying grapes and smoked brie I suppose I’m flush with money.
In that case, make as much as you can in a day, and freeze it yourself. Wrapped in wax paper and put in freezer bags it should last about 6 months. Pennies on the dollar for cost, with just the investment of a day or so laminating butter. If where you are doesn’t have air conditioning, I’d highly recommend doing this in the winter.
I’m partial to wrapping up brats in it and baking it that way. Little salt on top of the egg wash and some spicy mustard makes a great party snack. Or movie snack. Or self care Sunday snack.
Pan fried frozen burritos chopped up with added onions, rice and salsa thrown in a tortilla and rolled into Burritoception
We did Indian themed rice three times last week. And biryani would really require some cilantro. I’m completely limited to what’s in the pantry or can be foraged from my yard right now. I used the last of my basmati the other day. This was the last of my long grain.
I’d never put peas in a quesadilla. But they are fine in rice.
Cilantro could be the deal maker. Not for me but that’s a cliff…
cilantro grows great from seed, it just doesn’t live very long (according to the gardeners in the house that have experience, not me). like we’ll plant some seeds: in a week we’ll have thriving cilantro, and in another week it will have all either been eaten or died. so if it works for your zone, i highly recommend.
I’ve tried aggress cilantro multiple times and I end up with thin little shoots that bolt instantly. It is to way too hot here for it to thrive or even be remotely useful.
If I want cilantro here I’m either going to have to buy it or I’m going to have to set up a dedicated cat proof indoor growing area.
Looks great. What did you season the rice with?
Cummin seed, onion, red pepper flakes, paprika, MSG, salt, a tomato chicken cube, garlic, onion powder. And I used turkey stock for the liquid.
so my mexican friend who is actually from mexico taught me a few things
the first was that the west coast mexican food i love is very different from the food in the texas-mexico border town she grew up in. i may like mine better (more fresh salsas) but hers is still delicious (more butter and chocolate).
the second thing was that tacos are the [clear out your fridge and eat your leftovers] food. just reheat whatever you saved and throw it in the (corn, flour is for fajitas and burritos) tortilla.
although that bean and rice you got there, it looks like it doesn’t need a stay in the fridge to make great tacos.
i just checked my electronic recipe repository and could not find my wife’s mexican rice recipe, so it must be a paper copy somewhere. i’m not getting out of bed to get a recipe tho, that’ll just make me hungry. remind me tomorrow. the key ingredient in her recipe is tomato paste (get the stuff in the tube, not the cans, because you can save the rest when you only need 1T of tomato paste. unless you need an entire can then it’s worth the cheapness) but i know there’s more to it. maybe it’s just the mirepoix and broth.
I am a West Coast Mexican food person. The only corn my Mexican food oversees is the corn tortilla. My brain automatically rejects Tex-Mex and it’s use of fresh corn.
I don’t have any of the tube stuff right now. I did think about opening a can figuring I’d find another way to use it either in Italian or Mexican. Instead, I decided to go for a cube of tomato chicken bouillon which is why you don’t see a lot of color here and even though I rinsed those black beans the moment they touched the rice, all the red disappeared from it.
Oh, broth. Forgot to add that in my list. I have gigantic stockpiles of turkey stock I made from free turkeys and canned. I used it instead of water for cooking the rice.
my mexican friend who is actually from mexico
Does this imply that you have at least one mexican friend who is actually not from mexico?
Yeah. Mexican is both an ethnicity and a nationality. Like, I have Mexican friends from high school that were born here in California (which was Mexico before it was Statesia do not get me started) it’s like, the one of easiest ways to identify someone cool is whether they drink topo chico
