Herby Green Rice With Peas & Beans

This recipe was excellent, though I had to make a couple of substitutions - chickpeas for the white beans, and feta for the goat cheese. I can imagine other combinations; it's really the green sauce that makes it better than many similar recipes. The baking directions were so odd. "Precisely" (!) 17 minutes, and then maybe 10 or 15 more? It took about 25 minutes in my enameled cast iron Dutch oven. I think most people can understand a dish like this might require a range of times; I don't understand the reason for the use of the word "precise" here.

With all of the rice issues plus high starch factor, I’m wondering if I could use quinoa instead of rice??

First of all, I love this recipe and make it often -- however, it always takes 45+ minutes to cook. I'm using a Dutch oven and I have an oven thermometer to confirm the temperature is right. What could possibly be causing it to take over double the expected cooking time? I'd love to figure out why so this could be a quicker weeknight meal for me.

Hi Sarah, thanks for this promising recipe! Just one tiny question. In de list is it says: crumbled goat cheese Do you mean a chèvre like cheese or more feta like, or should both work?

I’m seeing a lot of variation in the cooking times and wanted to propose a theory: the color and material of the pans cooks are using.

TL;DR: use a heavier pot (like one made of cast iron) to hit the timing mark on this recipe.

In baking, the color of your sheet pan/cake tin can make an enormous difference to the outcome of your cakes and cookies. This is because different colors and materials absorb or reflect heat differently. The original recipe here calls for a Dutch oven. Usually made of heavy cast iron, these absorb and hold onto heat very well, radiating heat into the food inside consistently.

If you’re using a lighter, thinner saucepan (as many report doing), your pan is simply going to react differently to the heat of a 400F oven. Lighter-colored pans will reflect some of the heat of the oven, rather than absorbing it and radiating it into the food inside. These will, naturally, take longer (perhaps a LOT longer) to achieve the same amount of cooking inside.

Ovens are indirect heat sources, which will only exacerbate the pot material difference. Gas ovens, especially, cycle on and off to raise and lower the temp around your target (400F). Cast iron is great in this situation because it will maintain a pretty steady temp the whole time, having absorbed a lot of heat. A lighter and/or thinner material won’t hold onto as much of the heat, so it’ll fluctuate more with the oven’s fluctuation.

See here for more: https://www.thekitchn.com/do-dark-colored-pans-heat-differently-weve-got-chemistry-219610

I made this for dinner, and it is great! I added another 3 minutes after the 17, in our rental kitchen. I used more lemon zest as there isn't a zester here, and we topped with poached eggs. I will definitely make this again!!

Made this tonight and it was great. I didn't have goat cheese or cilantro on hand but used feta and parsley instead. Still delicious ! Thanks for sharing!

I made this last night, and it cooked in the 17 minutes (which was a relief, after reading the comments). I have to say I wasn't really into the flavors, but I loved the technique and can't wait to try it using black beans or kidney, carrots, and maybe some poblanos with chiptole (I'm a fan of Mexican food!). Thanks for the recipe!

What a wonderful recipe! I needed the extra 15 min for the rice and substituted fava greens for the spinach. A great way to use my farmers market finds!

I made a double batch tonight for dinner and it was wonderful! Too hot outside to turn on the oven, so I cooked it in the rice cooker on the white rice setting after sauteing the onions/garlic/rice and stirring in the blended broth/greens. The rice was perfectly cooked, and we ate it all. I'll be making this again soon!

Not sure what to tell you. I know for certain my recipe for Spring Rice with Peas and Lemon made on the stove with Jasmine rice works every-time. Been making this for a LONG time and never fails. Good luck! BB

I just saw the timing comments. I'm 26 minutes in and it's all watery. This is weird. Not using a Dutch oven, just a big sauce pan. And white basmati. Which on the stove cooks in 18-22 min. At 30+ minutes rice is still raw. WTF? This is quite annoying. I don't actually know what to do. Certainly I'm now expecting mushy peas and beans. Maybe test this using regular stuff (like sauce pans) because not everyone has a medium or smallish dutch oven?

What happened to my response? I compared my Spring Rice with Peas (entered in latest contest) as they are similar. Both are very good!

I just made this with brown rice. The flavors were excellent, but the oven method was very slow. It took 1 hr 20 min and I had to add ~3/4 c. extra water partway through. Next time, I think I'll cook the rice/green broth in my rice cooker, saute the onion/garlic/spinach/peas/beans in a pan on the stove, and combine it all at the end with the goat cheese/mint/zest. I'm hoping that will cut down on cooking time. I could also see these flavors working well in a risotto or with farro or barley.

Beans and rice, this is a perfect combination. They will make a nutritious dish. Thanks for recommending and sharing the recipe.
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This was bright and lovely with great potential for mixing it up in the future. The cooking time was off for me too--at 17 minutes the liquid was barely absorbed. I added an additional 15 minutes.

This was delicious, though I needed to leave it another ten minutes before the rice was cooked. I skipped the lemon and mint and used sorrel in place of spinach, and queso fresco for the goat cheese. This is definitely a technique I'll use again with other greens and herbs.

Thank you! I can't wait to try this! Beans and rice are my staples. It looks delish!

Could you make this with brown rice? Thanks.