easy pilaf

I know how excited everyone gets about a good one-pan dish. This family-friendly, easy pilaf has minimal hands-on time and dish washing but maximum flavour. Purists will note that this isn’t an authentic recipe, but the results are delicious so that’s good enough for me. This is a great lesson in balancing flavour, texture and temperature so that every mouthful makes you smile. I taught this on my last California teaching tour and so many of my students send pictures each week of their families eating it.

Once you have the technique down you’ll be able to make it Paella-style, Middle Eastern, Indian or Italian. You can play around with the protein and veg too. Scroll down to the bottom of the recipe for all sorts of different versions. I love how a recipe like this stretches a small amount of meat a long way. I have made this with 4 small chicken thighs for 6 people without any raised eyebrows.

If you want to get more veg into your diet, use half rice and half cauliflower rice. No one will notice. Scroll down to the bottom of the recipe to find out how I make cauli rice.