A rice dish with spinach and cheese

I prepared another vegetarian rice dish that I liked and thus want to share with whoever is interested. I cheated by using a tin of spicy spinach with cottage cheese (maybe you prefer to prepare that yourself) but I never can resist the feeling to do something more. And I know, it seems rice and potatoes should not be used for the same meal but I do as I like them together. Further, I don't eat meat thus I don't eat cholesterol and saturated fats and thus I think I am allowed some wrong combination.


Ingredients

Tin: Palak paneer (the above mentioned spicy spinach with cottage cheese).
Other vegetables: Onion, Potato, Lentils (dry), Black-eyed beans (dry), Almond nuts, celery leaf.
Herbs: garlic, ginger, salt and pepper, dry basil, vegetarian bouillon.
Rice
Olive oil

Recipient

Start with boiling the dry lentils and beans as they need some time to soften. I added some bouillon.

In the meanwhile, clean some potatoes and cut them in pieces. After about 15 min of boiling the dry vegetables, add the potatoes to the lentils and beans and continue cooking. I also added some small pieces of ginger (according to preference).

Now start boiling rice: cut some garlic and add to a pot with hot olive oil. After a very short time to prevent the garlic burns, add loose rice (I used brown rice but other rice can be used), mix and return on the fire. Mix again, return again for a short time to the fire before adding water (be careful as steam develops). Boil until all water is gone but not longer as otherwise the rice will become too dry or even burn (look on package for the correct amount of water to use).

While the rice boils, return to the vegetables and cut the almond nuts and onion in small pieces. Then add the nut pieces to hot oil in a pan and after a short period, add the onion pieces to the oil and reduce the fire. Stir sometimes to prevent the food burns. When almost ready, add some pieces of garlic for a short period.

In the meanwhile, the beans and potatoes are almost ready and after removing some of the water (not all), add the palak paneer as this has to heat for about 10 min. Stir and leave on a light fire and cover the pot so it can heat slowly. Halfway this period, mix the onions and nuts with the other vegetables and leave for another 5 min.

Rice and vegetables are ready around the same time and the meal can be served. Enjoy it.

Rice and vegetables next to each other, decorated with celery leaves.
Rice and vegetables can also be mixed if you prefer this.

Additional tips

As usual, I recommend to use your imagination so you can prepare your own dish. For instance, you can add some hot peppers if you like it really spicy. And some tomatoes are ideal to soften the food if you don't like it hot while their red colour will suits very well the green of the spinach and make the dish even more appetising. Finally, for those who like something that resembles meat, you can add vegetarian meatballs, so you continue eating vegetarian but with something that resembles meat because I know it can sometimes be difficult to stop eating meat.

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