Prep: 5 mins · Cook: 20 mins · Serves: 2
There is a kind of comfort in very simple food.
Not complicated comfort — not a dish that took three hours and a long list of ingredients. Just the particular satisfaction of a bowl of rice that is exactly right. Fragrant from jeera, warm from ginger, seasoned with salt that actually tastes like something.
This is that kind of rice. It goes with everything. It also goes with nothing — just a bit of ghee poured over the top and nothing else on the plate.
Some days the best meal is a bowl of rice that smells right and asks nothing of you.
What You Need
- 1 cup basmati rice, washed and soaked 20 minutes
- 1¾ cups water
- 1 tsp cumin seeds (jeera)
- 3–4 pieces Dry Ginger Flakes (Sendriya Life)
- ¾ tsp Himalayan Pink Rock Salt (Sendriya Life)
- 1 tsp ghee
- 1 bay leaf
How to Make It
- Heat ghee in a heavy-bottomed pot. Add cumin seeds and bay leaf. Let the cumin crackle and turn golden.
- Add dry ginger flakes. Stir once.
- Drain soaked rice and add to the pot. Stir gently to coat each grain in the ghee.
- Add water and Himalayan salt. Stir once.
- Bring to a boil, then reduce to the lowest flame. Cover tightly and cook 12 minutes.
- Remove from heat. Do not open the lid. Let it rest 5 minutes. Fluff with a fork and serve.
On using Himalayan salt
Himalayan Pink Rock Salt has a slightly mineral, rounded flavour that table salt doesn't. In a simple dish like this — where salt is one of only three seasonings — the quality of the salt actually matters. Use a little less than you normally would. It goes further than refined salt does.
