I enjoy grocery shopping, I like looking at the food, smelling the fruit and talking to the cashiers. What I don’t really like is taking two kids to the grocery store. So when I’m hungry I scour the fridge and make something out of whatever I have to avoid dragging my kiddos to the market.
That’s how I came up with this surprisingly delightful jambalaya. So use this as a start, if you don’t have tomato paste use diced tomatoes, fresh or canned. If you don’t have black beans use red or pinto, if you don’t have broccoli add spinach or frozen peas during the last step. Make this recipe your very own!
Ingredients
2-3 Tbsp of olive oil
1/2 cup of onion chopped
1/3 cup of celery chopped
1/3 cup of bell pepper(red or green) chopped
1 head of broccoli separated into florets
3 cloves of garlic chopped
2 cups + 1/4 cup of no-chicken broth
3 tablespoons of tomato paste
1/2 cup of frozen corn
1 can of black beans (rinsed and drained)
2 Tbsp of dried thyme leaf
1 Tbsp of Old Bay Seasoning*
1 tsp of garlic powder
1/2-1 tsp of salt
2 cups of long grain white rice (rinsed)
Directions
Cook rice with 2 cups of no-chicken broth and 1 3/4 cup of water for 20 min or until all liquid is absorbed.
While rice is cooking, heat olive oil in a large pot on medium heat. Add onions, celery, bell pepper and broccoli and cook for 3 minutes until onion is soft and translucent. Next add garlic and tomato paste and remaining chicken broth. Mix the tomato paste evenly so you wont have any clumps. Add old bay, thyme, garlic powder and salt. Cook for 3 min.
(taste a piece of broccoli if it’s tasty move to the next step, if it needs more flavor add more spices and salt)
Add corn and cook for 1 min. Cover and turn heat to low until rice is done cooking. Once rice is finished dump all the rice in the larger pot and mix until the vegetable sauce is evenly distributed. Finally add the black beans and gently mix so you don’t break the beans.
Enjoy!!!
*If you don’t have old bay seasoning use 1 tsp of celery salt and 1 tsp of paprika, or 1 tsp of creole seasoning. Just make sure you use something with paprika.