House Spouse

Lunch for me can be either daunting or thrilling, or both. When we got back home from Georgia (I know, I know, enough about Georgia already), I vowed to make myself fresh, healthy, vegetarian lunches for the rest of the summer. This is daunting because there are always dishes to be done post lunch that can throw me off track for the rest of the day: while doing dishes, I always notice something else to be cleaned, creating a sort of spiraling frenzy of house keeping all day which puts me in a bad and resentful mood. It’s also thrilling because I am so fortunate to work at home and thus get to eat freshly made lunches.

I am somewhat embarrassed to reveal that the brown rice with peas was inspired by French Women for All Seasons, and so I should qualify why I have the book to begin with. Andrew sometimes brings home books sent to work for review that no one wants to review. He thought I’d be interested, at the very least, in the recipes and the approach to eating seasonal. I’ll save you from my own book review and just say that I appreciate the approach to eating.

So, where was I? Oh, yes, freshly made lunches. I pared down this recipe to be enough for one and, of course, adjusted it to my tastes and what I had around.

(recipe after the jump)

Brown Rice with Peas for One
Adapted from French Women For All Seasons

Ingredients
1/3 cup brown rice, prepared
1 tsp olive oil
1/4 tsp butter, unsalted
1/2 Tbsp minced shallot
1/4 cup fresh or frozen peas, shelled
1/2 - 1 tsp lemon zest
salt and pepper
chopped fresh (or dried) dill

Heat the oil in a skillet, then melt the butter. Add the shallots and lemon zest, sautéing for about 5 minutes. Add the peas and cook until just tender, adding a touch of water if the shallots start to brown before the peas are ready. Add the cooked rice, season with salt and pepper, and stir to combine.

Remove from the heat and plate. Garnish with herbs and squeeze a touch of lemon juice if you like. I used some cilantro from my window garden and some dried dill, but parsley is recommended in the original recipe.

You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.