Recipe 50 from The Smitten Kitchen Cookbook by Deb Perelman
WW Note: I don’t know if it’s reasonable but I calculated this at 7 points if you scooped 12 servings and 9 points if you scooped 10. I thought the serving was tasty and filling enough for 7 points. You can skinny it up depending on how you use butter substitutes, lower point bread crumbs, and what kind of rice you choose but these points are for recipe as is without any tradeoffs. I think you can drop a few points per serving if you swap out the butter alone and find a lower point rice.
50 recipes! Let’s take a moment and be amazed for a second! We are moving along nicely and I feel amazed that I’ve kept up with this commitment. It’s such a silly thing but I’m so proud! It motivates me in strange ways and keeps me excited about cooking. Deb Perelman herself has sent some love my way in the form of heart emojis on Instagram when I’ve tagged her Smitten Kitchen account in my story. I have sent along my appreciation for helping me learn so much in the kitchen and keeping me excited about learning new recipes. It’s been a fun journey so thank you for following along!
Okay back to our regularly scheduled program…
I have been a tad behind on these recipes because of holidays and food budget and I’m excited to be catching up a bit as I plan to wrap up the Vegetarian Mains chapter of The Smitten Kitchen Cookbook.
I kind of wish this dish had come up a few weeks ago because it would have been a perfect contribution to Thanksgiving. I am not a big fan of wild rice but if you “gratin” something I’m going to at least consider it and this was a delicious thing to consider!
I found a rice mix at Aldi that was a compromise for my dislike of wild rice. It had white, brown and wild rice in it which means it didn’t take a long time to cook but came together in 15 min or so. It was just the right mix but probably added to the point count in the end since wild rice is not as many points as white or brown rice.
And I’ll order and demolished just about anything that has caramelized onions in it! These onions are in many ways what makes the dish so amazing though my husband thought it was the swiss cheese! He’s probably not wrong either! Because…well…cheese.
But let’s be real….the best part of this whole dish is hiding vegetables in it! Putting kale in something like this is genius and also the mind of a mama who is always trying to hide vegetables in anything and everything. Deb speaks to that in the recipe introduction whose picky eater son helped inspire this dish.
We used a block of swiss cheese I found and grated because I didn’t want to pay for emmentaler itself. I don’t know if I would have known the difference but if you’re a big cheese connoisseur then you may cringe at any such a substitute.
I used panko bread crumbs which were likely lighter then she intended when saying bread crumbs but worked just fine for us.
It’s really pretty isn’t it? Food should taste good and be pretty. I’m still learning how to capture its beauty but then again all I use to blog these days is my phone so there’s only so much that can be done.
I think this recipe is a rich and savory side dish but worked like a casserole for us for more than a few meals too. If you have rice lovers in your crew this is a must try but obviously for average rice lovers like me it’s still a win.
You can find the recipe in a few places:
Happy rice making folks!
The Novice Life 