Cilantro Lime Rice

Cilantro Lime Rice recipe that will make you forget all about Chipotle is right here!  We love making rice bowls for dinner at our house and the base of every good rice bowl is a great cilantro rice. We love to top ours with black beans, pulled pork, and all the fixings. This recipe is super quick and easy and don’t worry, I have a few tricks and secret ingredients that will make all the difference so scroll on down….

Here in Casa Jones, we are all about a killer Tex-Mex rice bowl or big fat burrito bursting with way too many ingredients. Hand to heart, we eat some form of Mexican food at least 3 times a week.  If you own my cookbook, you know that I always have some cooked chicken breasts in my fridge and I love to transform it every which way into something Southwest. Usually, the base of all of my Tex-Mex creations include this Cilantro Lime Rice recipe.

If you have every eaten at a Chipotle restaurant, then you can attest to how crazy good this style of rice can be.  But don’t go judging THIS cilantro rice based on your previous experiences. My recipe will increase your love of this Southwest staple 100 times over.  Yes, 100 times.  It is that good!

All you need are a few easy tricks for it to turn out perfectly delicious every time!

How to Make Cilantro Lime Rice

1. Use Jasmine Rice –  I know you already have a big bag of standard white rice in your cupboard, but this secret ingredient that makes all the difference. Jasmine rice is an aromatic rice grown in Thailand that as soon as you open the bag, you can’t help but take a big whiff of the amazing scent. The end result is a slightly sweet, full flavored rice like nothing you have had. You can find it in any grocery store.
2. Rinse the Rice –  One of the properties of any rice, especially Jasmine rice is that it can be very sticky.  That is a great feature when you are making sushi rice but not so great when you want to make Cilantro Lime Rice.  When you rinse the rice until the water is clear, you have removed a lot of the starch so you end up with individual pieces of rice once it is cooked.
3. Use Some Butter – I’m not saying to throw in a whole stick of it, but that little bit of fat and flavor does amazing things to your end result.  My recipe only calls for a couple tablespoons so please trust me that you need it!
4. Only Use Fresh Lime Juice – I know how much we all love those little green plastic limes that sit in the produce section next to the fresh limes but do yourself a favor and grab the real deal instead.  You only need one.

 

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