Arroz Valenciana ala Mrs. Lam Rice: A Rousing Success

The holiday season has truly began.

We can hear classic Christmas songs being played over the radio, people starting to make their wish list and families are already planning what to buy and prepare for the celebration.

With a few months to go before Noche Buena, this should be a perfect time to practice cooking some of well-loved food for the holidays. How about try your hands in making your family feel like Christmas even this early with a treat of Arroz Valenciana this weekend.

Arroz Valenciana is a dish similar to Paella, a Spanish dish with seafood, sausage, chicken and the spice called saffron.. The Filipino version of this dish makes use of coconut milk, malagkit (glutinous or sweet rice), boiled eggs, and chorizo.  

I recently discovered Mrs Lam's rice to have so many varieties; locally milled rice from the fragrant Dinorado Special, Whole Grain Sinandomeng, Long Grain, Sinandomeng Special, Sinandomeng , Laon (old crop),  Organic Red, Organic Brown rice to the imported ones like Japanese and Thai Jasmine. Even the packaging was appetizing to look at. For everyday use, Danica suggests the fragrant Dinorado Speccial or Sinandomeng Rice; for special occasions or events with visitors that you want to impress, go for the Thai Jasmine rice or the short grain Japanese variety rice.

I will use Special Sinandomeng for this recipe and let's see how delicious this dish can be.

Ingredients

1/4 kilo. chicken thigh or breast

1/2 cup malagkit (glutinous white rice)

1 cup rice
3 pieces chorizo

2 tablespoons tomato paste

1 medium red bell pepper

½ cup raisins

½ cup frozen green peas

2 cups chicken broth

1 cup coconut milk

1 medium tomato

1 medium yellow onion

3 cloves of garlic

3 boiled eggs

3 tablespoons  olive oil

a pinch of Spanish saffron
1 teaspoon paprika

Salt and pepper to taste

Instructions:

1. Combine the malagkit and rice. Wash with water and then drain. Set aside.

2. Heat the olive oil in a wide pan.

3. Saute the crushed garlic, diced onion and tomato. 

4. Put-in the chopped chicken. Cook for 3 minutes.

5. Add the chorizo de bilbao slided diagonally. Cook for 2 minutes.

6. Add-in the salt, pepper, saffron, and paprika then stir.

7. Pour in the chicken broth along with coconut milk the let it boil.

8. Add-in the washed rice..

9. Add the tomato paste. Cover and simmer for 5 minutes.

10. Put-in the raisins, and green peas. Cover and  simmer for 8 minutes.

11. Add-in the red bell pepper. Continue to simmer until the rice is fully cooked.

12. The, garnish with sliced boiled egg to make it very inviting. 

Now, here's the finish product: Arroz Valenciana ala Mrs. Lam Rice... definitely a rousing success on our dining table!