My family has been getting really bored with the plain white rice I’ve been serving.  In an attempt to keep peace in the household, I’ve been looking for some new recipes for rice.  I thought I would experiment with layering some traditional flavors of onion and green pepper and bacon.  While searching through some recipes I found a few that had the basic ingredients I was looking for.  After a few modifications, I came up with this recipe which turned out way better than I had expected and was a big hit at my household this week.  I served this as a side dish with baked chicken.  However, since it is such a substantial dish, it can really serve as a main course if you just add a protein to it (either shredded chicken and/or black beans).

Below are the steps I took in making the spanish rice bowl.  (I’ve listed the ingredients at the bottom of the post).

First, I sauteed bacon in a frying pan.  While the bacon was cooking, I chopped up the green pepper and then the onion.

Once the bacon was done cooking, I drained it on a paper towel and set it aside.  I discarded all but 1 tablespoon of the bacon drippings and added the chopped green pepper and onion to the skillet.  I cooked them over medium heat until they were tender.

Next I added a 14.5 ounce can of diced tomatoes to the skillet along with the black pepper and cayenne pepper.  I did not drain the tomatoes.  I let the mixture simmer for 15 minutes.  At this point the kitchen was really smelling nice!

While the skillet mixture was simmering, I made a batch of long grain rice.  (I combined 2 cups of water to 1 cup of rice, brought it to a boil, and then simmered it for 15 minutes.)

Once the skillet mixture had simmered for 20 minutes and the rice was completely cooked, I added the bacon and the rice to the skillet and combined all the ingredients thoroughly.

I served the rice in individual serving bowls, and added shredded cheddar cheese to the top.

Quick & Easy Spanish Style Rice

Ingredients:

3 Pieces Bacon
1 small white onion
1 small green pepper
1 14.5 ounce can of diced tomatoes
1/4 teaspoon black pepper
1/4 teaspoon cayenne pepper
2 cups water
1 cup long grain rice
1 cup shredded cheddar cheese

Optional
2 cups shredded chicken
1 cup black beans