Farm Share Vegetable & Wild Rice Pilaf

Farm share vegetables--carrots, radishes, celery and onion--sautéed and combined with wild rice for a side dish that goes with a wide variety of dishes.

My 5 yr old daughter: Where is the soy sauce?

Me: There is no soy sauce. This isn't that kind of rice. It's Uncle Ben's.

My 7 yr old son: Who is Uncle Ben?

The first summer we spent in the midwest we ate at a country buffet restaurant. It was a new experience for all of us. My son earned a coupon from a summer reading program so we explored our new environment through food. My kids had never seen long grain rice and were mystified that you could eat rice with butter, not soy sauce.

[After being stationed in both Japan and Hawaii, and learning how to make my own sushi even before joining the military, I'd forgotten all about long grain rice. Our staple rice, cooked in the rice cooker because I'd burn it any other way, is yellow bag calrose or hinode rice.] 

This recipe is not some wow amazeballs novel innovative dish. It's just a simple way, when you're looking at a pile of vegetables from the community supported agriculture (CSA) farm share, to get those veggies out of your refrigerator and into your family. We ate it as a side dish with ham. I stirred chicken chunks and bok choy into a batch. My kids ate bowls as an after school snack [it is a Costco-sized container of rice after all].

Farm Share Vegetable & Wild Rice Pilaf (serves 6 to 8)

1 to 2 Tablespoons olive oil
3/4 cup chopped onion (I like all the veggies chopped pretty small)
½ cup chopped carrots
½ cup chopped radishes
½ cup chopped celery
1 cup wild rice blend (mine was from Costco and contained brown, wild, and red rice)
3 cups broth (I used Thai Turkey stock because I had it, but vegetable stock would also rock)

In a large saucepan (3 qt) over medium heat, preheat the oil. Add the chopped vegetables and stir to coat them with fat. Sauté for 5 to 10 minutes until softened. Stir in the rice and coat with fat. Add broth and bring to a boil. Cover, reduce heat to low, and simmer for 30 to 40 minutes until rice is cooked and the liquid is absorbed. Fluff with a fork before serving. Add soy sauce at the table (or use salted broth, or add a teaspoon of salt to the pot while cooking).

This post is linked with What's Cookin' Wednesday