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Rice6 min

Saffron rice, the plain way

Onion, rice, salt, butter, and a pinch that has already spent fifteen minutes in hot water.

This is the pot that tells you whether a new jar was worth opening. There is nowhere for a tired saffron to hide. If you want jewels, nuts, and dried fruit, add them after you know what the threads taste like on their own.

Serves 435 minutes, including the bloom

Plain saffron rice

Ingredients

  • 0.05 to 0.1 g saffron threads
  • 2 tablespoons hot water
  • 1 1/2 cups long-grain rice, rinsed until the water runs mostly clear
  • 1 small onion, minced
  • 2 tablespoons butter or olive oil
  • 3/4 teaspoon kosher salt
  • 2 cups water

Method

  1. Crush the saffron with a few grains of the salt. Steep it in the hot water for 15 minutes.
  2. Warm the butter in a saucepan. Cook the onion until it turns translucent.
  3. Stir in the drained rice and the rest of the salt. Stir for a minute so the grains look glossy.
  4. Add the 2 cups of water and the saffron, threads included. Bring it to a boil.
  5. Cover, turn the heat to low, and cook 15 minutes. Take it off the heat and leave it covered for 5 minutes.
  6. Fluff. The grains should be separate and gold, deeper where a thread is sitting.

If your rice package insists on a different amount of liquid, follow the package and count the saffron liquid as part of that total. Taste a grain. You want rice, butter, and a hay-honey floral note.

If the pot is only yellow

Three things produce bright rice with no floral taste. The jar is old. The threads went into the pot dry and met a hard boil. Or turmeric did the painting. Turmeric is welcome in your kitchen and it is a different ingredient. Leave it out the first time you try a new jar, so you can taste what you bought. The bloom, if you skipped it, is explained on Saffron Cook.

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