Baked rice

How to make baked rice or arròs to forn .

The Valencian Community is a land of rice, there is no doubt about that. In addition to the famous and well-known paellas, there are also other dishes such as banda   rice or rabbit and snail rice .

On the blog you will find many  very famous rice recipes in Valencia and all the Spanish Levante. It is an area that we love at home and every summer we spend a few days enjoying its beautiful beaches and its rich gastronomy.

On one of those visits we discovered the rice baked in the oven or rròs al forn , which we cooked at the home of friends, and it completely conquered us.

It is a “harvesting” recipe, since the remains of the stew are used for its preparation. There’s no way it could be bad, right? It is a dry rice , which is prepared with a bomba rice in this case La Fallera and traditionally cooked in a clay pie. If you do not have at home, nothing happens, but it must be a wide and flat casserole.

The oven is also essential, obviously. In many places they took him (and they still do today) to the baker in town or in the neighborhood, to cook in the wood oven.

For this reason it is also called Arròs passejat or Arroz Paseado , because there were no ovens in the houses and the casserole with the rice was walked to the bakeries.

Given that in almost all of Spain we have cooked on family menus, it will be very easy to prepare this baked rice.

Anyway, today I am going to make the recipe from scratch, with the ingredients purchased. So you can do it any day, without having to wait for leftovers from a good stew.

Baked rice preparation

1. We put the cooked broth to heat in a saucepan.
2. Peel the potato, chop it into slices (in a bakery), fry it and reserve.
3. The rib, we will ask that they chop it in the butcher shop. In the casserole or pan that we are going to prepare the rice, brown the rib, with olive oil. We withdraw and reserve.
4. Chop the bacon and the blood sausage. We fry in the same oil. We withdraw.
5. Grate half a tomato. We put it in the casserole and fry it for 2-3 minutes. Add the rice, mix and let it toast for a couple of minutes. We add the saffron and mix everything well.
6. We can preheat the oven. 10 minutes at 250º C.
7. We pour the hot broth, and we are incorporating the rib, bacon, sausages and the cooked chickpeas.

Final preparation of baked rice

1. We distribute the rice evenly. On the surface, we place the sliced ​​potato and the remaining tomato, also cut into slices.
2. Finally, we place the garlic head in the center. We put the pan / casserole in the central tray of the oven. We cook 20 minutes at 200º C. We are checking the liquid, in case our oven drains too much.
3. We remove from the oven, cover with a clean cloth and let stand 4-5 minutes before serving. We want it to be a dry rice, and with the grain loose.

Being a dry rice, we are going to use 2 parts of liquid for one of rice. And in this case we will use broth from the stew , so that it absorbs all the flavor. When done in the oven, it will be consumed more slowly, and at the end of the preparation we will leave it for a few minutes resting, until reaching the optimum point.

As you can see, a very traditional recipe, not too complicated and that you will like without a doubt. I hope you do it at home, and you know, send me photos of the result. This traditional recipe is one of my favorites when I go to Valencia and I advise you to freeze the broth when you prepare cooked to have it ready to prepare this delicious rice at any time of the year.

If you still do not have it clear, I leave you a step by step in photos of this recipe for baked rice so that it comes out as authentic Valencians.