Once a week (or every other week) a friend of mine and I would gchat taking about various dishes or meals we’re planning to eat that day, what we ate, recipes we tried, etc.

So earlier this week I was trying to figure out what to eat based on what I had on hand at home. The problem I have is that I am planning to leave for a trip out of country so whatever I make I wanted to make sure it is just enough to last til I have to fly out so nothing gets wasted. Then I realized that I had about a pound of BBQ pork and a pound of roasted pork that were sitting in the freezer that I had purchased from meat shop weeks prior. So I moved the BBQ pork to the fridge and decided to just cook up a batch of rice and have BBQ pork on rice.

But that was just plain boring. One thing in Vietnamese cuisine is that we love our oiled green onions. So I purchased a bag of them at the local grocery and chopped them up and simmered them with a little bit of vegetable oil. In the meantime I got the crock pot going with white rice and water and instead of plain white rice I decided to season it up a bit for additional flavor.

I got this idea after visiting a Persian restaurant about a month ago and they had a batch of dill rice that I really liked, but instead of cooking the rice and mixing the dill afterwards I decided to cook the dill in while the rice was cooking so that the flavor would (hopefully) be saturated into every grain of rice.

Turned out I was right and voila! A batch of dill flavored rice with BBQ pork. Nom nom nom nom. Now I think I would give this a try with other seasonings too to kind of spice up the traditional white rice to make sure the flavor is well saturated.

Unfortunately I didn’t take pictures like I am prone to do when I go out for meals… I was too hungry to think about “ooh must take pictures so others could see!” ah well maybe next week, except I think I will try something different and see.

Anyway after my endeavor here is a bit of the conversation thereafter:

10:01 AM: i ended up making rice, adding green onions and eating the roasted pork or bbq pork
10:03 AM Friend: that sounds pretty yummy
10:07 AM: i got into the habit of adding a little bit of seasoning into the rice as it cooks for a little more flavor. i got the idea after eating rice w/ dill in it at several restaurants and i rather enjoy the taste or even when eating at chipotle the rice has a touch of lime and i think cilantro…

I got the pork from Hon Kee a restaurant found in Uptown Chicago on Argyle. Prices are by pound but reasonable as far as I am concerned, I managed to get about five bowls of rice with one pound of BBQ pork, but then again I don’t really eat much to begin with.

If you are wanting an actually recipe for the Persian Dill Rice, I found one that I probably would have used if I didn’t just “play it by ear” on the fly from the My Persian Kitchen blog:

Ingredients
3 cups basmati rice
4 cups fresh dill, stems removed
1 tsp minced garlic
4 tbsp brewed saffron
4 tbsp canola oil
salt

Instructions
1: Cook rice
2: In the mean time rough chop dill and place in a bowl. Sprinkle generously with salt and mix well. Adding salt at this point makes a huge difference in the the taste of the dish.
3: Then add minced garlic and once again mix well until all nicely incorporated.
4: Place 2 tablespoons of canola oil and 2 tablespoons of water in a non-stick pot and shake to mix. Add a couple of spatulas of par-boiled rice and a small handful of dill. Normally, at this point the rice is built up by alternating layers of rice and dill. However, I have found that it’s best to simply mix the remainder of the rice with the dill in a separate bowl and then simply place it in the pot in the form of a pyramid. Create 5 holes with the back of the spatula through the rice.
5: Cover rice and cook on high for 10 minutes.
6: Mix 4 tablespoons of brewed saffron with 2 tablespoons of canola oil. Carefully distribute the mixture all over the rice. Wrap lid in a towel and continue cooking covered for 1 hour.

Anyway… enjoy!