Rice has always been my top comfort food. It’s what my mom would feed me when I was sick, and the only food I ever wanted to escort me out of the haze of flu. As an adult, I vacillate between making beautiful, simply-cooked pots of plain rice and more elaborate creations that I think of as “wild style.” Lol. The simple preparations are the most comforting – basic brown short-grain rice with a bit of salt and (maybe) a pat of butter or drizzle of good olive or sesame oil. The wild style versions are the opposite. They’re exciting to make – even invigorating!  It’s when I grab from different cupboards, raid the spice drawer, and supplement the rice with other grains. I’m never 100% sure how things will turn out, but I make note of favorite wild-style versions in my notebook so it’s easy to revisit them. This Spicy Sesame Coconut Rice has lots of stars next to it.

This version isn’t over-the-top ‘wild” per se – you probably have all of the ingredients on hand. But it’s a combination that’s just off-beat enough to be special. This recipe makes a pot of brown rice cooked in a thin sesame-coconut broth. It’s showered with lemon zest and drizzled with sesame-chile oil if you like a bit of heat. It’s the kind of rice that goes nicely alongside a brightly cooked vegetable, and as the star component in whatever rice bowl you might be dreaming up.
You can see the coconut rice here, served family-style for lunch yesterday. It’s pictured topped with tempeh crumbles, the last of an avocado, simple steamed asparagus, and scallion paste (just green onions pulsed with a splash of olive oil & a pinch of salt). If sesame rice isn’t your thing, but you want a way to get more greens on your plate, make a jump to Bryant Terry’s Amazing Green Rice, or browse all these other rice recipes.

A few favorite rice sources included: Massa Organics, Koda Farms, Lotus Foods, and Toiro Kitchen. If you’re on my mailing list, I also put a bunch of favorite rice links, books, and media in there & will link to it in the archives once it goes out. Enjoy! xx -h

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