Sides » Saffron Rice
Print RecipeIngredients
Washing & Soaking Rice
- 3 cups basmati (long-grain) rice
- 6 cups warm water
- 1 tbsp salt
Cooking
- 6 cups water
- 1 tbsp salt
- washed & drained rice
- ½ cup vegetable oil
- 1 pita bread round, split in half and ripped into large pieces
Saffron Mixture
- ½ tsp of saffron threads
- ½ tsp sugar
- 1 tbsp butter, melted
- 1 tbsp water
How-to
Prepare Saffron Mix
- Grind ½ tsp saffron threads in a coffee grinder with ½ tsp sugar (or use ½ tsp of pre-ground saffron). Mix in small bowl with 1 tbsp melted butter and 1 tbsp water and set aside
Wash & Cook Rice
- Put 3 cups of basmati rice in a large bowl. Add enough warm water to cover the rice and wash gently by hand. Drain and repeat two more times.
- Transfer to a clean large bowl, add 6 cups of warm water to the rice and 1 tbsp of salt. Set aside for 1 hour
- Heat 6 cups of water to a boil in a medium pot with 1 tbsp of salt
- Drain the rice and transfer into the boiling water. Allow to cook uncovered for 6-8 minutes. Stir the rice once during this time
Assemble
- Turn off the heat, remove rice from pot, and drain the cooking water
- Dry the pot with a paper towel before returning it to a low heat and adding vegetable oil
- Lay torn pita pieces in the bottom of the pot to cover. Transfer back the drained rice to finish cooking atop the bread and oil. (If one desires, one can add 1 tbsp of butter to the rice at this point)
- Cover with lid and steaming pad, or a lid lined with paper towels. Reduce heat to medium-low and let the rice cook 20-25 minutes.
- Once the rice is ready, turn off the stove and remove ½ cup of rice to a separate small bowl and combine with saffron mixture
- To serve, scoop rice onto a large platter. Garnish top of the mound with the remaining ½ cup of saffron rice. Place pieces of crisped pita from the bottom of the pot around the platter
Mahin Alavi
Mahin was raised in a family of 4 children and became interested in reading books about cooking at the age of 15. She wanted to go to cooking classes but could not because those classes were only offered in the capital Tehran, and she lived 600 miles northwest of the capital. She begged her mom to let her cook lunch for the family. Mom looked over her shoulder and dad was her greatest supporter and encouraged her to come up with her own recipes.
Mahin believes in 3 requirements for becoming a good cook: you must really love cooking; you must understand that it takes time to make a good dish and you can’t shorten the time and as such patience is a must; practice makes perfect. The more you practice, the more confidence you gain in your cooking abilities.
A favorite dish in the part of the country where Mahin rew up is making large meatballs (8" in diameter). To make such a large meatball one needs to grind the meat and mix it with onion, mint, parsley, cooked rice and split peas. Once a big ball of 8" diameter is made from this mixture, the trick is to keep the ball together while it is being cooked in water with oil and spices. Mahin wanted to impress her husband during the first week of their marriage and I tried this dish. Unfortunately, she had not mixed the ingredients well enough and the ball fell apart while being cooked. So she first served soup to her husband and he liked it and asked about the meatball. She told him the story and he laughed a lot. At that point she realized she had married a man who would be as supportive of her cooking as her dad.
Saffron threads come alive when added to long-grain rice. Once the rice is washed and allowed to soak for about an hour, the rest of this Iranian dish is a snap. Slices of pita bread line the bottom of a pot and take on a wonderfully crispy texture. Good enough for a meal by itself or pair with Mahin Alavi's Chicken with Barberries.
Mahin Alavi
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