Healthy Spanish Rice My Toddler Loves

Total Time: 1 hr 25 mins Preparation Time: 25 mins Cook Time: 1 hr

Ingredients

• Servings: 6
• 1 (14 ounce) can chicken broth
• 1 (14 ounce) can diced tomatoes with green pepper celery and onion
• 1 (4 ounce) can green chilies
• 1/2 medium sweet onion
• 1/2 teaspoon cumin
• 1/4 teaspoon paprika
• 1/2 teaspoon garlic salt
• 1 1/2 cups whole grain rice
• 1 1/2 cups water
• 1 cup spanish rice, from above recipe
• 1 tablespoon butter
• 3 ounces shredded mexican blend cheese
• 1/4 cup orange puree
• 3 medium carrots
• 1 medium yams or 1 medium sweet potato
• 5 -6 tablespoons water

Recipe

• 1 this is sort of 3 recipes in 1, but it's worth the effort if you have small kids and are fighting to get them to eat something other than mac and cheese!
• 2 i put all of the spanish rice ingredients in my rice cooker and press the button - that's it. for anybody who hasn't discovered the absolute glory of rice cookers - you can do the same thing on a stovetop - and in either case you may need to add extra water - make sure to check after about 30 minutes. keep in mind that whole grain rice can take nearly an hour to cook.
• 3 the orange puree seems like a pain but is not hard. i do it about once a week - cut up the carrots into 1 or 1/2 inch pieces, and slice up the yam - then stick that in a steamer for 20 minutes or so. if you don't have any steamer, you can boil them for a similar amount of time - maybe less - but i haven't tried boiling.
• 4 make sure the carrots and yam are plenty softened, then put them in your food processor (better than a blender, although it can get the job done) - put at least 5 or 6 tablespoons of water - and puree until smooth. the sneaky chef lady says you only need 2 or 3 tablespoons - but i think it's better with a bit more.
• 5 this gets you maybe 2 cups of puree - which i freeze in 1/2 cup containers. i take 1 out every few days or so, and it's good for 2 to 3 days once you put it in the fridge. one day i forgot to thaw some out - and my son wanted his rice - so i chipped away at the frozen stuff and put it in the stovetop rice mix, and it worked out fine.
• 6 then for the final product! put around 1 cup of the spanish rice into a pan with 1 tablespoon of butter, and 2 or 3 tablespoons of the orange puree (tablespoons can be heaping or not depending on how much of that sweet/carrot flavor you want). add the cheese - i put around 3 oz or so - and heat up on medium-low - until the butter, puree, and cheese are all nicely melted and mixed.
• 7 now serve to a hungry kid! with the above recipe you'll have plenty of spanish rice and orange puree left over - freeze the extra puree and refrigerate the rice, which will be good for 4 or 5 days.