Warm Rice Salad with Ham and Hard Cheese

Name: Warm Rice Salad with Ham, Cheese and Fried Vegetables
Prep time: 30 min
Cook time: 15 min
Total time: 45 min
Cuisine: Italian cuisine
Ingredients: Rice (parboiled) 0.5 cup (90 g); Ham 150 g; Hard cheese 50 g; Bell pepper 2; Hot pepper 1-2; Green peas 100 g; Pickled gherkins 8-10; Black olives (pitted) 12-15; Cherry or cocktail tomatoes 8-10; Fresh basil 2-3 sprigs; Olive oil 3 tbsp; Soy sauce 1-2 tsp (or salt); Sugar 0.5 tsp (for the peas) (2 g); Salt for cooking the rice

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45 mins

Homemade rice salad is a tasty, filling dish that works equally well as an appetizer or as a main course on its own. I think a warm rice salad with fried vegetables, ham and gherkins can easily make a great side dish for meat. This salad is made without the usual salad dressing, since most of the ingredients are fried in olive oil.

The salad needs fluffy cooked rice and fried vegetables. Everything else can be swapped for seasonal ingredients or added to your taste. For example, the fried ham can be replaced with sardines in oil or tuna, even seafood, and you get a rice salad with fish or a special seafood salad. Pickled gherkins can be replaced with capers, and green peas with canned corn.

Usually a salad is a cold dish. But since some of the ingredients are best served warm (fried vegetables, fried ham), it is better to bring the salad to the table without chilling it, and then it keeps its flavor and freshness. The salad is fairly complex in composition, but most of the ingredients are available all year round, and you can always combine new additions to find a unique, one-of-a-kind mix.

If you like, the rice can simply be boiled, or after boiling it can be lightly fried in the oil left over from the vegetables and ham. Then the rice salad will have a wonderful color, because the fat left after sweating the vegetables is brightly colored. If you add a little soy sauce to the rice while frying, the rice salad needs no extra salt, and fried rice will add a new note of flavor to the salad.

One of the most popular salads of this region is tabbouleh. It is made from bulgur with plenty of parsley and mint, lemon juice and olive oil. Rice salad is a close relative, made on the same principles and just as varied. If you like, you can add a platter of fresh vegetables to the salad, a simple cucumber and tomato salad and other additions. You can experiment with the ingredients.

Ingredients

2 servings

Rice (parboiled) 0.5 cup (90 g)
Ham 150 g
Hard cheese 50 g
Bell pepper 2
Hot pepper 1-2
Green peas 100 g
Pickled gherkins 8-10
Black olives (pitted) 12-15
Cherry or cocktail tomatoes 8-10
Fresh basil 2-3 sprigs
Olive oil 3 tbsp
Soy sauce 1-2 tsp (or salt)
Sugar 0.5 tsp (for the peas) (2 g)
Salt for cooking the rice

Step-by-step recipe

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Preparing the ingredients and cooking

Since rice has a neutral taste, add ingredients with a pronounced flavor to the dish. For example, pickled gherkins, basil, bell pepper and hot pepper. Most Mediterranean salads tend to contain olives and tomatoes. I recommend adding boiled green peas or green beans to the rice salad. Canned sweet corn is also an excellent option.

Prepare the ingredients: the vegetables, olives and gherkins, the rice, a piece of lean ham or cured pork loin, a piece of hard cheese and a few sprigs of fresh basil.
The rice for this salad needs to be fluffy. Parboiled rice works well – it is often sold as “steamed”. In Italy they use local varieties such as Arborio, Carnaroli and so on. For the cheese, Emmental, Gouda, Swiss or Radamer are all great.

Boil the rice and the green peas. Cook the rice in lightly salted water until done. Usually fluffy rice is cooked in a specific amount of liquid – the proportions are known for each variety. If that’s a problem, cook the rice in plenty of water and drain it in a colander. Cover the green peas with water, add 0.5 tsp of sugar (2 g), cook until done and drain.

Frying

Fry the peppers. Seed the bell pepper, preferably a mix of colors, and cut it into cubes. Remove the seeds and inner membranes from the hot pepper and chop it finely with a knife. Heat 1 tbsp of olive oil in a saucepan and fry all the peppers over medium heat, stirring. The pieces should lose a good part of their moisture, shrivel and turn golden.
Fry the ham. Cut the ham or cured pork loin into cubes. Heat 1 tbsp of olive oil in a saucepan and fry the ham over high heat, stirring constantly, for 3-4 mins. Then take it off the heat right away.
Fry the rice. Heat the remaining 1 tbsp of olive oil in a saucepan and add the cooked fluffy rice. From here there are two options. You can salt the rice and fry it in the oil. But it’s simply tastier to add 1-2 tsp of natural soy sauce, stir and fry for 1-2 mins, stirring. This is roughly how Chinese fried rice is made.

Assembling the salad

All the fried ingredients for the salad should cool down. They shouldn’t be cold, but noticeably warm.

Mix the vegetables and ham. In a deep bowl, combine the boiled green peas, the olives cut into rings, the finely chopped gherkins and the tomatoes – remove their seeds first. Add the warm fried ham and all the fried peppers to the bowl.
Add the fried rice, cooled to warm, and mix thoroughly.
Stir until all the ingredients are evenly distributed. Rice salad is not dressed or salted any further. The olive oil in which the ham and peppers were fried is quite enough to keep the dish juicy.
Make the cheese and basil topping. Grate a piece of hard cheese and put it in a blender. Pick the leaves off the basil sprigs and chop them lightly with a knife. Grind the cheese and basil in the blender to dry crumbs of a pleasant emerald color. This is usually how the base of Italian pesto is made, with additions such as garlic, pine nuts and olive oil.

Serving

Arrange the salad on plates, sprinkle generously with the cheese and basil, and garnish with sprigs of herbs, olives, tomatoes and gherkins. Since the salad suits a side dish or a main course better, use dinner plates rather than salad bowls.
The rice salad is served slightly warm. It is a bit like warm, fragrant pilaf – filling and tasty. If you serve the rice salad as a side dish, I recommend a big piece of fried meat or a breaded chicken cutlet .

Calories and macros

700 kcal

Serving ≈ 520 g

Protein28 g17% of kcal
Fat39 g52% of kcal
Carbs54 g32% of kcal

100 g135 kcalProtein 5.4 gFat 7.4 gCarbs 10.4 g

Calculated from the recipe ingredients, excluding salt and spices. Data: USDA and Matvaretabellen.

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