Rice Grits - A Three Ingredient Treasure

I really like this recipe because of it's simplicity. It's also fairly fast and quite tasty! I consider rice grits to be a base recipe. Use rice grits to extend a protein source or use them as a side dish. Rice grits are a worthy substitute for mashed potatoe or pasta sides.

Rice Grits

Ingredients:

• 1 cup, rice
• 1 tablespoon, butter
• 1/4 cup, grated parmesan cheese

Preparation:

Pour 5-1/2 cups of water into a medium sized pot and bring to a gentle boil.

While the water is coming to a boil we will process the rice into uncooked grits. Grits are simply broken pieces of rice. I was able to get good results by placing the rice into my blender and zapping it at high speed for about thirty seconds. I rocked the blender every five seconds to ensure that the rice blended throughout. If you're more comfortable with pulse and shake every five seconds then do that!

To finish processing the rice we'll pour them from the blender into a fine mesh wire strainer. Shake the strainer a bit as we want the dust to fall out the bottom. The dust is waste and in my experience amounted to about 1 tablespoon. The pieces of rice that remain in the strainer are your uncooked rice grits.

Now, place the grits into the pot of boiling water. Return to a gentle boil and then simmer for 15 minutes.

At the 15 minute mark we'll drain the rice reserving 1 cup of the cooking liquid. The aforementioned wire mesh strainer helped to make this job easy. Return the rice and one cup cooking liquid to the pot, cook over medium heat while stirring continuously for 5 minutes.

At this time we stir in the butter and grated parmesan. Stir until the butter is melted and spread throughout. Let the grits cool slightly and serve!

Comments:

I kept the ingredient list to just three as I wanted to present rice grits as a base recipe. Of course salt and pepper to taste is recommended. I'd also recommend 1 tablepoon of lemon juice stirred in and spread throughout.

Rice grits are similar to mashed potatoes in that they'll hold their shape. Like mashed potatoes you will be able to form a well. With mashed potatoes that well is often filled with gravy though with rice grits I think we can be a little more creative. I'm thinking more along the lines of seasoned chopped tomatoes or green peas or cooked carrots. Scrambled eggs or nicely cooked shrimp would also be winningly served within the well of a bowl of rice grits. I do not recommend strongly flavored foods as this would overpower the prized parmesan flavoring.