Brown Basmati Rice

I discovered brown basmati rice while waiting for my deli guy to notice my vast array of food. I have a tendency to shop, for food or otherwise, while hungry (I'm always hungry) ... so it was hard to resist buying all sorts of items such as Porto Rico Mocca Java coffee (which they offered to grind, I graciously declined), avocado, ready-made Szechuan-style wheat noodles and a banana for my daughter.

As often occurs when you are both parts impatient and hungry, there was a long wait at the checkout counter, as the guy working decided there was no need to hurry up with the delivery order (yes, ONE order) in front of mine. But I'm not an angry person, or rather, I refuse to act angry, so I pretended to not mind, and looked around while waiting.

Ooh, biotin conditioner, that's neat! I thought to myself. This place has the most random stuff, I continued to say, in my mind. Then in the rice aisle, not far from my eye line, I saw it - Della Brown Basmati Rice. Now, that's something worth trying, I thought, and added it to the already heavy pile of items.

I didn't waste much time trying it - I had arroz con pollo planned for the family, and since I wasn't sure they would try brown rice, I decided to prepare it separately. My favorite arroz con pollo recipe comes from "The Family Dinner: Great Ways to Connect with Your Kids, One Meal at a Time," as it is relatively foolproof.  I often balk at cooking rice in a stewpot with other items, since I am used to cooking with a ricecooker - but I felt adventurous today.

The directions for the basmati were fairly simple- bring 2 1/2 cups of water to a boil, add 2 tsps of olive oil and salt to taste, then stir in the rice and cover. Seeing as I was already daring myself to try a new item, I threw in a bay leaf and a cinnamon stick to the lot.

35 minutes later, after I took the pot off the heat, and stirred the rice with a fork, it was done. The rice was nutty and delicious, and with the sauce from the arroz con pollo was a great addition to the rice. But it needed more, in my opinion, so I stirred in a spoonful of red pepper-eggplant dip from the fridge. The vinegary zing was exactly what my brown rice needed.