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Feed your appetite for cooking with Penguin’s expert authors

Feed your appetite for cooking with Penguin’s expert authors

Dinner with Rukmini

Browse all of the recipes in Rukmini Iyer’s cookbooks by ingredient.

All-In-One Pilau Rice with Mushrooms and Saffron

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All-In-One Pilau Rice with Mushrooms and Saffron

This quick and easy mushroom pilau is a delicious meal in itself but would also pair well with a hot curry or even topped with a fried egg.
Serves 4
Total 40 min
Prep 10 min
Cook 30 min
Easy

Introduction from Rukmini Iyer

Although I am something of a purist when it comes to pilau rice (the one my mother makes with cashew nuts is quite possibly the best thing I’ve ever eaten), this oven version with mushrooms is a new go-to – incredibly flavoursome for how little time it takes to put together. This dish will look beautiful with girolles or chanterelles if you can get them in season, but it’s just as good year-round with chestnut mushrooms.

Ingredients

3 big pinches of saffron
250g chestnut or wild mushrooms, whole if small, halved if large
200g basmati rice, rinsed
350ml vegetable stock
1 bay leaf
45g unsalted butter
100g unsalted cashew nuts
A handful of fresh coriander, chopped (optional)
To serve:
natural yogurt

Method

Preheat the oven to 210°C fan/230°C/gas 8.

While you’re assembling your other ingredients, soak the saffron in a tablespoon of boiling water and let it steep for at least 5 minutes.

Tip the mushrooms, rice, stock, soaked saffron, bay leaf and 30g of the butter into a medium roasting tin or a lidded casserole dish. Cover very tightly with foil or the lid (this is important or the rice won’t cook), then transfer to the oven and cook for 30 minutes.

When the rice has had 25 minutes, put the cashew nuts on a small baking tray with the remaining 15g butter and a pinch of sea salt, and pop the tray into the oven on another shelf.

Remove the rice and cashew nuts from the oven. Let the rice sit for a few minutes uncovered, taste and adjust the salt, then scatter over the nuts and coriander, if using, before serving with natural yogurt.

Note: I would say this is a meal in itself, because a bowl of rice certainly feels like one to me, but you could think about adding a fried egg or serving with a chickpea curry for a more traditionally balanced meal.

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From the book: The Roasting Tin Around The World

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