This looks absolutely delicious. I've tried several of your recipes, with great success - I really love your website! Which of the three do you recommend, the tomato paste, fresh tomato, or cooked tomato?

Could this be converted to use *brown rice*?

Our family's Mexican rice is something I have been trying to get exactly right for quite a while. The recipe is a little different than yours -- I finally got it right when my grandmother gave up two secrets that she had left me without for months ... 1) brown the rice uncomfortably long - until it's about to burn and 2) add a squeeze of lemon at the end.

Interesting how families do things just a little differently when it comes to recipes. I am sure there could be an entire book with various family Spanish rice recipes. How about those people that add peas to their rice???

This is what we call, "Hoosier" Spanish Rice. Been making this for my family for over 50 years. In a Large Cast Iron skillet. I brown, Kalbaska Sausage, cut in small pieces, with chopped onion, chopped bell pepper, red and green, a bit of Garlic, salt and pepper to taste. Cook until onions and peppers are tender and saugsage partially done. Then I add fresh, small cubed, tomatoes, lightly saute'ed. Then I add my uncooked rice, about two cups, browning ever so slightly. After all cooked together, I then add water, about three cups and simmer until rice gets fluffy. Stirring occassionally. When water boils down and rice is tender, I continue cooking a little, in order to dry up most of liquid ( needs to be fairly dry ).Make sure all ingredients are throughly mixed. It is oh! so good. Served with toasted bread or even heated Taco shells. Maybe a salad and glass of cold sweet tea. It is very filling. Make sure and make a lot, as it is better the next day. To warm up, just pop in Microwave for a minute or two. They will all come back for more. Enjoy this very inexpensive dish. Just judge for yourself as to the amount of each ingredient, in order to feed your family.

This sounds yummy. Just one question. The ingredient list calls for tomato paste but the directions say add tomato sauce. Which should it be? Thank you.

wonder if we can use rice cooker to make spanish rice?

In my family we refer to the original recipe as Mexican rice and Barbara's version as Midwestern Spanish rice - though we use bacon instead of Kolbase. The latter is a very flexible dish - you can add browned hamburger to make it a more filling dish, for example, or coarse grate veggies like carrots or zuccini (i.e. not strong tasting) and you barely know they are there while adding nutrition. Any form of tomatoes can be used - even tomato juice or half tomato soup+ half another form. Got a couple of stalks of celery you need to use up? Saute them good and throw them in. I've made both recipes with brown rice - they're good but distictly different in taste than with white rice. Of course, nutritionally brown rice is vastly better. I rarely make it exactly the same way twice - I'm trying Kolbase next! And I'm planning to try it with V8 juice or jalapenos soon.

Loved it, loved it, loved it. I added cilantro as well the 2nd time and it was great.

Re: "...genuine Spanish rice..."

"French dressing" is not French, any more than what the Spaniards call "Russian salad" is Russian.

"Spanish rice" is a traditional dish, and just because it isn't actually Spanish doesn't mean it is somehow illegitimate.

BTW, Spanish rice bears no resemblance to paella, valenciana or otherwise. It's closer to what the Spaniards call "Cuban rice" (minus the egg, plus some veggies.)

Hi Elise! I LOVE your blog.

My auntie has been trying to make spanish rice, and it just never comes out the same way twice. Normally she will make a small batch first and test it on her family (lucky them! hehehe) but when she doubles the recipe the rice comes out mushy. Hopefully that will not be the case with your recipe, but do you have any insight on what she might have been doing wrong in the past?

Simply simple! It couldn't sound easier to make thanks for not complicating such a simple dish this was a big help for someone like me so white washed! thanks!

When my mom makes Spanish Rice, I think browns the rice in oil and then blends the tomato (which she peels after letting it cook on foil on the stove), onion, garlic, chicken broth and other ingredients in a blender. Then she just mixes the new liquid into the rice and lets it cook.

It's delicious.

The key to cooking ANY rice and keeping it from becoming MUSH is, once you add the liquid DO NOT stir it for any reason. Cover it and let it cook until it is done.
P.S. I loved the recipe! For those of you whom like a little "KICK" instead of the tomato sauce, paste, or cooked tomato try adding a can of Rotel {Brand Name} tomato with green chilis. you can get Rotel with cilantro too if you like. When purchasing the Rotel make sure you look at the label, it comes medium regular hot and extra hot.

I just tried your recipe and OH my god. It's so delicious. And I even used it with Ready Rice, which is all I had on hand. I used two bags, but took them out of the bags to saute them as instructed, and just added the amount of broth per bag as recommended on the Ready Rice package. THANK YOU! I have been looking for a good Spanish rice recipe for ages. This'll go great with the beans I've been cooking all day. Mmmmm!

Help!
Really need some advice about cooking rice. I can't seem to get the rice to cook through and through. I never take the top off........4 cups of broth or water (steaming) to 2 cups of rice, stir, restart boiling process, lower and cover. What am I doing wrong. My family loves rice so I use the pre-cooked bags of rice, but would prefer using the regular kind. I follow the recipes in my cookbooks to the letter with no success.

Celeste

Great recipe! Thanks!

Celeste, I used to not be able to make rice either. Until I stumbled on my own little secret. As long as you use regular rice (not instant or similar), use 1 cup of water per 1/2 cup of rice. Do NOT follow the instructions on the bag. Once the water and rice are in a pot, turn your stove top on very low. My stove top's highest setting is 7, so I set it at 1.5 - 2. Cover and let cook. It will reach a boil and stay at that point after a while. Do not stir the rice at all. Once you cannot see any water in the pot the rice is done. It is fluffy and does not stick. Perfect rice every time without using a non-stick agent such as oil.

I just got my mom's rice recipe today (we had it practically once every week when I was growing up- I don't know how it is possible that I can't do it by memory!). It took her ten years to learn how to make it so that it tasted like her Mexican mother-in-law's! We put LOTS of garlic salt and cumino in it. Before my mom and I went vegetarian, we also put this Mexican spice in it. I forget the name, but it was something "con pollo."

I've been making this recipe for about a month now and it's fantastic. I grew up in El Paso, Texas eating Mexican food, New Mexican food, and Tex-Mex, and spanish rice is a comfort food for me. I like my rice with deep tomato flavor and with the smoky hint of cumin, so in addition to chopped tomatoes I add a little bit of tomato paste and about 2 tsp. of cumin. I'm going to serve this to friends from home next time I visit and I know they will love it.

I love this recipe! My partner loves Mexican food and I am Chinese and know nothing about Mexican food. I wanted to make rice to go with a pack of Carnitas I purcharsed at Costco. I made this rice for her and later made it for my Mexican friend who only eats her sister's Spanish rice and she had SECONDS, THIRDS, FOURTHS of my rice. She couldn't get enough of it! I've been using this recipe whenever I make Mexican food like tonight I made it to go with Pork and Green Chilies stew. I used long grain Jasimine rice from the Asian supermarket, brown it as long as I can before burning it and I used double the garlic.
Thank you very much for this wonderful recipe!

I love this recipe. I use rice oil to brown my rice--that makes sense right. You can get the oil very Hot. My kids like this alot.

Great recipe! Easy to do and just delicious! Thank You!..

One of the most flexible recipes in the world. What can't you put with onions, garlic and tomatoes? Try some cumin, hot red pepper, peas, pine nuts, bits of chicken. If you like it and got some, put it! Wait! Got it. No strawberry ice cream!

Your mom is the best. We love her/your recipe. I've made this recipe 4 times in the past 2 weeks. It is the absolute best! Thank you so much!

Ok, at the risk of sounding crazy, I'm going to let you all in on a family secret. For those of you following exact instructions for cooking rice and it still comes out dry and al-dente, next time use a plastic shopping bag under the lid.

A plastic shopping bag?!! I told you it'd sound crazy, but stick with me here...

Some pot lids, like mine (I use aluminum pots for all my rices) warp with time and so the lid no longer becomes tight fitting (or for whatever reason, never made a tight seal from the beginning). A non-tight fitting lid will cause steam to escape rapidly without steaming the rice but not if you use a shopping bag. That's right, a shopping bag right from the grocery store! What I do is once the water begins to boil, I reduce the heat and drape the bag over the opening, place the lid on top, and so the handles of the bag aren't dangling, I hook each of them over the nob of the lid - nice 'n secure.

My family has been using a shopping bag to cover rice for years and I have personally done it a thousand times, and no, the bag does not melt! Instead, what you get is perfect cooked, fluffy rice each time.

Oh, here's another secret - shhhh, don't tell my mom I told ya: to keep rice from being sticky and making it nice 'n fluffy (according to the correct rice/liquid ratio for the type of grain you're cooking), add a tablespoon of white distilled vinegar to the liquid at the beginning. The flavor cooks out, so you don't taste it. Same trick applies to poaching an egg (with the vinegar, that is.) Enjoy!

Great tips, thanks Ricco! ~Elise

I made this tonight as a side for the taco party my girlfriend and I just put on. It was a hit! Thanks.

Hello! Just had to come back and leave a comment. I've made many versions of Spanish Rice, being in a Mexican family, and something is always 'note quite right' but this came out *perfect* The only variation I made was to add a half teaspoon of crushed red peppers, since both my husband and I like our food spicy. I'm sure it was the chicken broth that made the difference. I usually use water, or the juice from the tomatoes. This was delicious. Thank you!

Hi all!

I'll be making this recipe as my base for some Enchiladas Suizas...but I have to comment on Ricco's message. Heating plastic with steam, then letting the steam seep back into the food is releasing Phtalates, which act pretty much like hormones. This is not a good idea. The idea in cooking rice is indeed to have a lid that is not tight-fitting because you do want to have a release mechanism for the steam...or else it would be a pressure cooker. Not happy saying something that can be unpopular, but it's important, especially if you are feeding children, their bodies are smaller and more susceptible to contaminants. These compounds are being phased out of plastics because they are known to cause health problems. No one would expect people to use plastic bags in their rice making, so I will think that these are not manufactured to be safely used while cooking. Happy cooking and keep up the great work Elise!

I am planning on making this Spanish rice recipe tonight and taking to a potluck. I will make it and it will sit for an hour before we eat. What is the best way to keep the rice warm and consistency good? Crockpot?

Crockpot would probably work fine. Or you can zap it in the microwave. ~Elise

I lived in San Antonio for a long time and have since moved out of state - the thing that I miss most is the food. Until this recipe, I'd never had any success trying to replicate the tasty rice (that you get at the restaurants) at home. Thank you SO much for allowing me to recreate a little of the southern Texas goodness in my home.

Adam E.
Salt Lake City, UT

Great recipe! Got rave reviews all around and will be sharing your website with friends. Thank you!

Yum, this is much the same way I learned from a friend who owns a Mexican restaurant. He said the key is to sauté the rice, which I never knew before.

Barbara's "Hoosier Spanish Rice" recipe is close to how I make Jambalaya, just add some cayenne and spices, whatever meat is on hand, and homemade chicken or beef broth instead of water (this is essential to getting the best flavor).

I'm born and raised in New Mexico, but for some reason my parents never made this and I haven't before either... I'm used to having it at restaurants as a side all the time :-) I'm going to use vegetable broth (some vegans will be eating it), and add cubed cooked carrots and peas (don't know why but growing up I always remember those being in there!) Thanks for the recipe, I'm glad it looks pretty straightforward, and I'm glad I looked it up because I probably never would've thought to brown the rice first! I'm probably also going to sub some hot salsa for some of the tomato...

I made this tonight and it was great. I think I will be making this very often with all types of dishes, it is so flavorful and so much better than plain old rice. I made it with your enchiladas (my first foray into enchiladas) and your homemade salsa. It was a great meatless Friday meal. Thanks!

Kudos to James up there for the 1 cup to half cup rice! My predicament was having to cook spanish rice for 50 people. In this case, the 2 to 1 ratio did not apply. The more rice you have in the pot the less water you need. I used a tip from Ming on KPBS. He used his hand to measure. The distance from the knuckle to the first bend was how he did it. At first I thought he was bat sh** crazy but after frying up a 2 pound bag of rice and staring at it for half an hour I thought "GO FOR IT!" It turned out PERFECT. I fry the rice first in peanut oil until (as the other poster up there said) every grain was dark almost too brown color. Then I added chopped onion, green peppers, garlic and salt/pepper and stirred for a few minutes. Then I added the hot water mixed with the podwered Knox bullion Tomate flavored until it was about an inch above the rice. It was mmmmmmm yummy. It lasted about 20 minutes at the party. So for those of you trying it out I have 3 rules and my rice comes out great every time (I get volunteered for my fams and neighbors parties ALL THE TIME)

1. You gotta take the time and FRY THE RICE. Not quickly, honestly, for 6 servings it takes me at least 15 minutes to fry the rice first.

2. Use Tomate Flavored Bullion (it's made by Knor and in the soup isle) instead of tomato sauce. Dissolve it in hot water before adding to rice.

3. Once you get this basic down, don't be afraid to add different things to it. I add a can of Veg-all or peas to it, I even put chicken in it for Arroz con Pollo.

da best. Keep it going! Thank you

I could never do my moms rice till now! I spent two years just making it sticky and not even close to hers. My husband loved the way it came out! Thanks a whole bunch:)

Elise,
Thanks for sharing this recipe. I tweaked it a bit to our tastes but even on it's own was delicious. I made it to go with some homemade fajitas the other night. Well... I had a ton left over even after making a dozen or more fajitas for my family of 6 (7 but one is a baby lol)
So I thought I would share what I used some of the leftover rice for today.
Breakfast for me and two of my daughters as follows.

5 eggs beaten
3 T Salsa
5 heaping T of the rice
Real bacon pieces
butter or margarine
mini corn tortillas
sour cream if desired

In a small frying pan melt about 2 T butter add bacon pieces and fry until crispy or to desired texture. Add beaten eggs. Stir constantly over medium high-high heat until almost cooked through, add salsa and rice and finish cooking.
Pour onto a plate
Wipe the inside of the pan with a clean wet sponge and return to medium-medium high heat. Butter both sides of a tortilla very lightly and place in frying pan. (should sizzle or heat isnt high enough) fry on one side until just starting to get golden brown areas then flip and repeat. Flip out onto a small plate add some egg mixture top with sour cream and roll/fold and enjoy. Repeat for each. Very Delicious!
Enjoy and hope someone likes :)

Sami

This sounds almost like the recipe my mom has made for years, only we use green pepper, 1 can diced tomatoes and instead of seasoning it with oregeno, we use cumin to give it that Mexican flare! Yummy!

Delicious! Absolutely delicious. I like it with the fresh garden tomatoes. Simply the best rice recipe I have had in a very long time. And the best Spanish rice ever. Thank you for sharing.

When someone speaks of browning the rice, they are not talking of brown rice, they are talking about sauteing (browning) it on the stove with butter or some other fat. Brown rice had not been as processed, the outter covering of the rice grain remains, it will require more liquid and a longer cooking time.
Why not freeze the extra tomatoe paste in a ice cube tray in the amounts that you would use, for the next time. Or for something else that might call for it.
Also freeze the stock in the amounts you would use for the next time.

Hi - do I saute the rice uncooked first? Raw? Thanks!

Yes, you sauté the raw rice. ~Elise

Spanish rice is one of the hardest Spanish dishes to make. Mainly because of the browning, and the water-to-rice ratio is never as simple as the packaged directions, especially if you add veggies to the rice. There are so many different ways to make it and it NEVER comes out exactly the same each time.

I prefer tomato paste, but tomato sauce can be used as well.

And I agree with the previous posters that said the best Spanish rice is browned to the point of ALMOST burning, and the water/stock needs to be extremely hot. If I'm making a massive pot for a party, I like to add a package of mixed frozen veggies for color and flavor (peas/corn/lima beans/green beens).

This site is amazing by the way!

I made your Spanish Rice today for a potluck and everybody loved it. The flavor of diced fresh tomatoes is rather mild, so I added 1/2 tsp tomato paste as well - thus giving a more consistent tomatoish flavor for the rice. I added a pinch of cumin powder and a bay leaf too. I always find great tasting recipes on your site and I am a big fan!