Ingredient two SAFFRON = saffron rice

So in an effort to find four ingredients I have found many more ingredients I would like to play with.  

For this blog I am reporting on a compilation of ingredients that made up Saffron Rice.  

My husband loves rice but I get tired of the plain old recipes we usually eat.  They are tasty don't get me wrong but it's nice to have a variety and I enjoy givi my child new flavours to try for her palette. 

I started off by googling saffron rice recipes....each was different and not in small ways...so I decided to wing it this time.

Ingredients used: 

2 1/2 cups of Basmati Rice

1 box of Campbell's Chicken Broth (salt free)

1 tsp of saffron (a little goes a long way)

2 small grated onions (I grated so the kids didn't know it was there)

I simply boiled the rice and saffron in the chicken broth until cooked, ended up adding a bit of water if it looked dry. Added the grated onion when it was looking more like rice than a soup.....salted and peppered to taste.  Voila! 

I think this recipe turned out awesome and just as I expected....very flavourful!  Now most of the online recipes also called for turmeric but I happened to be out of this spice so didn't include it and it still looked and tasted beautiful!

Ingredient one LEEKS = leek soup

So I have a challenge child who "hates" onions.  I decided that one of my goals would be to change her mind slowly by introducing leeks to her as not an onion but as another food.  Here was my first experiment without a recipe and with simple ingredients put together.  I got my initial inspiration while searching recipes that included leeks, and found a lot of people used leeks and potatoes together.  I then decided because we have been sick in my house I would eliminate the cream/milk component and tweet it to our likes.  Here is how I did it.

First I cut three small onions and sautéed them until soft

While this is softening clean than slice three leeks into small pieces

Peel and dice three potatoes

 

Grate a while head of garlic

Once the onions are soft I added the leek pieces and let it cook a bit longer (6 minutes)

I then add a box of salt free Campbell's chicken broth,  add the potatoes and grated garlic. 

I added spices (1 tsp of thyme and rosemary) to season per our families likes, then cooked until the potatoes are tender (about 15 minutes).

Here is the biggest and most important step........I then blended the soup in a blender to incorporate all ingredients into a thick cream like consistency

This is the point where is put it back into the pan and added about 1/3 cup of shredded Parmesan cheese and salt and pepper to taste 

This was the finished product: 

And all three kids LOVED it! The one who hates onions.....was the first to finish too!