Do you ever order takeout, but make your salad or rice to help you STRETCH your meal? We did that the other night when I made super easy Greek lemon rice in a rice cooker.
Takeout For The Win!
We tried a new (to us!) Greek restaurant for takeout and it was SO GOOD!!! We ordered shrimp on skewers, chicken, and lamb. The lamb was the favorite. Two of our meals came with greek salad and they all came with amazing French fries – we loved the cumin garlic fries!
I added lettuce from our garden to stretch the salad into a large family size Greek salad and I ordered a chickpea salad, as well. I just dumped the chickpeas, red onion, and arugula into the Greek salad. Delicious!Â
We make A LOT of rice around here … How To Make Fluffy Indian Basmati Rice, Copycat Pork Fried Rice, and Kimchi Fried Rice With Kale are a few of our go-to favorites, but this super simple recipe is definitely going into the rotation.
Easy Greek Lemon Rice In A Rice Cooker
Easy Greek Lemon Rice In A Rice Cooker
Super easy, very delicious!
Ingredients
Ingredients:
- 3 cups basmati rice
- 2 tablespoons olive oil
- 1/2 medium onion sliced
- 5 cloves garlic sliced
- 1 large lemon - zested and then juiced
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 1/2 teaspoon cumin
- 1/2 teaspoon oregano
- 1 tablespoon fresh dill - more for the top
- Chicken broth
Instructions
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I rinsed 3 cups of white basmati rice until the water ran clear and then let the rice sit in water while I prepped the other ingredients.
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In a saucepan on the stove, heat your olive oil. Add the onions and garlic and the salt, cumin, and oregano. Saute. Add the lemon zest and the three cups of basmati rice, drained. Add the lemon juice to the rice and stir it well to coat your rice with the olive oil, herbs, and lemon.
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Transfer to your rice cooker - or continue cooking on the stovetop.
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I transferred the very flavorful rice to my rice cooker and added enough chicken broth to go a little higher than the 3 cup mark for white rice.
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Turn it on! That's it!
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At the end, I added additional lemon juice and fresh dill. I had read in some places to add additional butter at the end, but I did not do that. It tasted fine! I will definitely try to add butter on another day - I usually don't say no to butter.
This was my first experiment with Greek rice! Any tips???
I’m sure this is delicious, but the Greeks generally use uncle Ben’s rice instead of basmati.
HI! Are you kidding me? I am Irish, so I can’t tell if you are joking with me. 🙂
When you day 3 cups basmati rice, are you using the cup that came with the rice maker or a regular cup?
I am using the cup that came with the rice cooker.
I make a very similar dish but add chard or spinach to the rice. Then toss with plenty of fresh herbs just before serving.
Ooh!!! What a great idea! Sounds delicious.
Does this store well to be made the day before ?
Yes!
VERY TASTY! I will make it again. We paired it with fresh lamb we raised and processed this year. BBQ’d a shoulder blade medium rare and the rice totally complimented the meat. I used a high quality Basmati rice.
Thank you so much! I love that you raise your own lamb!
I made this recipe as written except I used brown rice and dried dill (as I didn’t have fresh). It was delicious and even my family who typically complains about brown rice liked it. I’m saving the recipe for future use. Thank you!
Thanks so much, Jaci! Love that dried dill added a lot of flavor!
Erin this is a fantastic recipe!!! 1st attempt was for family that was visiting. I finely diced the onions instead of sliced as I liked that it mixed with the rice consistency a bit better. Beyond that, it was phenomenal! A true crowd pleaser and will be made again!
Thank you so much!I sometimes dice the onions, too! 🙂
For anyone who’s wondering exactly how much broth to add, I added 3 cups, and it turned out beautifully!
Thank you so much for this, Caroline!
Will be a staple in our home now! So good!
Thanks, Chris! I am so glad you liked it!
I made mine entirely in the rice cooker. Chopped the onion very small, used dried dill also, added with olive oil, onion, etc., in rice cooker on white. When I added the rice, I used 3.5 level of broth for the 3 rice measurement cups (2.25 c), then I restarted the rice cooker. The guys liked it!
Thanks so much for your feedback! Glad they loved it.
We loved this! I added in extra herbs and steamed veggies and leftover chicken shawarma. So I mixed it all together at the end for a huge bowl of goodness.
Thank you so much for your comment. Your meal sounds absolutely amazing.