Oven-baked rice, “Arroz al Horno” in Spanish, or “Arròs al forn” in Valencian, is a dish coming from Xativa to Valencia and which is traditionally cooked in a terracotta dish called in Valencian “Rossejadora”.
It is a winter dish with cold cuts and pork cuts.
Ingredients
- 6piece Black pudding: onion & pine nuts flavour
- 300g Pork chop: "Coustellou" (fesh pork ribs) cut into small pieces
- 2piece Streaky bacon (Ventrèche): two beautiful slices of fresh pork belly
- 3piece Tomate: 1 grated to make mashed tomato, 2 cut in half to put on top of the dish
- 1piece Potato: peeled and cut into thick slices
- 1piece Clove garlic: entire
- 200g Chickpeas
- 1tbsp Sweet pepper
- 1g Saffron
- 600g Round grain rice
- 2dl Olive oil
- 1tbsp Salt
Instructions
- Boil the pork cheap cuts in your water
- Add the turnip peeled and cut into two or four pieces
- Add the chickpeas
- Fry in olive oil and in the terracotta dish, if it can goes over fire, or otherwise in a frying pan, the potatoes coins, and the two tomatoes cut in half. Set them aside.
- In the same oil, add the entire clove garlic, and brown the Ventrèche and the Coustellous over low heat.
- Then reduce the mashed tomato with everything and add the sweet pepper at the end.
- Add the rice and fry everything slightly.
- If you have used a pan, reintroduce everything in the terracotta dish.
- Add the black puddings and arrange everything harmoniously with the clove garlic in the middle
- Add the filtered broth already hot with the saffron.
- Put on top of everything the fourth halves of tomato and slices of fried potatoes.
- Introduce in your oven, already preheated at 220° for 20 minutes.
Recipe Notes
Variants of the oven-baked rice :
It is also often cooked with meatballs : the Mandonguilles.
The Oranese ("pied-noir") oven-baked rice contains "longanisse" hot or mild.
History or anecdote of the oven-baked rice :
The oven-baked rice is often called “Arròs Passejat” which means: "Walked rice", because the Valencian women did not have oven and had to bring their rice to the baker's oven of their neighbourhood.
We could see then, a ballet of cook with their terracotta dish ready to cook, in the streets of the village.
The history of this dish in Spanish here.