As a latina woman, cooking spanish food comes easy for me but I do enjoy trying out recipes that include ingredients I don’t typically use when preparing a latin dish. I pulled out my Williams-Sonoma Essentials of Latin Cooking cookbook and found a recipe for ‘Arroz con Pollo’. I decided to cook this meal their way verses the way I normally make it (which includes the base for most Puerto Rican dishes, sofrito).
Two spices that I was surprised to see in the recipe are saffron threads and cumin. Traditionally, I use saffron threads for middle eastern dishes and I mostly use cumin for Indian dishes. I was curious to see how these spices blended together would taste. As I was cooking the meal I could smell the combined spices and ingredients that were so aromatic. The meal was so good and bold in flavor. The only thing that I will alter when making this again is the amount of red pepper flakes and the jalapeno chile the recipe asks for because boy was it spicy. I mean I like spicy food (although as I get older, my stomach may not agree). Whoah, lot’s of heat in this dish but it was so good I couldn’t stop eating! I would just keep sipping water, attempting to put out the fire in my mouth!
The recipe called for 1 chicken, cut into 8 serving pieces but since I prefer white meat, I used skinless chicken breast instead and cut them into small pieces. This recipe can be found in this cookbook that includes everything latin from drinks, starters and snacks to soups, salads and more! To view a similar recipe that I found online, you can check it out, here.
Buen Provecho!
-Photos via Rose Angel
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