A homemade and rustic dish, perfect both for the Sunday lunch that for one dinner save leftovers: let's talk about the baked rice. Surely you have happened to cook the pasta gratinated and the concept is the same. Baked rice is based on one risotto, which can be the one prepared the day before and advanced, or even a risotto badly to be recovered, or a simple one boiled rice still to be seasoned. The possibilities are endless, but we start from the basic recipe, that of the baked rice with tomato and basil.

Ingredients for 4 people

300 grams of advanced or boiled rice (choose the one for risotto)
1 pack of 700 milliliter tomato puree
1 onion
2 mozzarella
Parmesan at will
extra virgin olive oil as needed
Salt to taste
basil leaves

Method

Prepare the tomato sauce, thinly cutting the onion and frying it with extra virgin olive oil. When it is golden, add the tomato sauce, arrange with salt and cook until it is firm.

If you have to cook the rice, put a pot on the stove with plenty of salted water. When it starts to boil, throw the rice and let it cook until ready. Keep it back from cooking, because it will soften again in the oven and may be overcooked.

Meanwhile, squeeze the mozzarella and cut into cubes.

Season the boiled rice (or the advanced one) with the tomato sauce and transfer it to a baking sheet. Spread the mozzarella, sprinkle with the parmesan and add the basil leaves. Put everything in a preheated oven at 180 ° C for about 20 minutes. If you want to get the crust on the surface you can activate the grill for the last 3 minutes.

Variants of baked rice

Baked rice is excellent even without tomato, for example starting with a risotto with pumpkin or to the Milanese, Which will be creamed in the oven with cubes of provolone or milk cream and of the Parmesan cheese. But in general the baked rice is perfect both in vegetarian version and with meat. Try it also with a risotto with sausage, greedy! We do not recommend it with fish instead, given the presence of cheese during the gratin.

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