Starting from frozen means the vegetables don’t overcook. On the downside, it also means the cooking process is slowed down somewhat. Rice, with boiling liquid added, usually takes only 20 minutes to cook in the oven. You can read more about that here.
A glass dish is really handy for this, because you can see how the rice is coming along without taking the lid off the dish. If you do have to take it off, of course be careful to keep your hand out of the steam that will rush out.
Starting with sausage meat gives you plenty of flavor, but use any ground meat you like. I actually used vegetarian ground round in the version in the photo.
You can also make this in the microwave, but I can’t tell you how long to cook it for because I haven’t tried that myself. Add a couple of minutes to the time it usually takes you to microwave plain rice (for me that’s about 12 minutes).
If you’ve still got some of those cinnamon hearts left over from my last recipe, or just from Valentine’s Day, here’s another way to use them up: Put a couple of spoonfuls in a teacup and fill it up with boiling water for a sweet hot drink. You do have to keep stirring till they all melt or they’ll stick to the bottom. It helps if you partly dissolve them first by throwing in a dash of whisky. Did I really just write that?
- ½ pound sausage meat or ground meat
- 1 cup rice
- 2 cups broth — any kind that will go with the meat
- 1 cup any kind of frozen vegetables, not thawed
- Cook the meat, breaking it up, till it’s no longer pink (or more if you like it better done).
- Drain it well.
- Meanwhile, bring the broth to a boiling point and preheat the oven to 350℉.
- Put the cooked drained meat, rice and vegetables in a medium ovenproof dish with a lid.
- Carefully pour in the boiling broth.
- Put on the lid and cook at 350℉ for about 30 minutes or till the rice is ready.
- Let it sit for a few minutes so the rice can absorb the last of the water.
