The Best Brown Rice Salad You'll Ever Have (With Avocado, Edamame, Mushrooms + more!) #TheRiceWay

I love rice. In a Filipino household, it’s completely normal (and expected) to eat white rice with every single meal of the day. When I started a healthier lifestyle, I had to cut it down significantly. Now I only eat it when my go to my mom’s for dinner and she cooked my favourite food lol. (Come on, you can’t have sinigang without white rice, man!) Anyway, I do eat brown rice almost everyday. It’s my favourite carb to eat with my meals because it’s pretty easy to make and I love the taste and texture. But dare I say… it’s pretty boring. I just make it as usual and eat it with a protein and some veggies.

Admittedly, I don’t normally “experiment” with brown rice. But I’ve recently discovered

USA Rice

and all of the delicious possibilities. I was completely inspired after looking through the recipes on their site and watching this video of Rose Reiseman talking about different types of rice. She also makes a similar brown rice salad to the one I’m showing you today. So it’s a good idea to watch it because we use a very similar preparation method.

That salad she makes in it made me so hungry so I decided to make my own! I put all of my favourite veggies (and fruit – avocado) in it! I promise you, you will never look at brown rice the same way again!

This recipe makes 5-6 servings (perfect for meal prep for two days for me.) I also do not measure when I cook (except the rice), so these measurements are estimates. Feel free to add as much or as little of any veggie you’d like. This took me about an hour and 15 minutes.

You will need:

1 1/2 cup of uncooked brown rice
1 1/2 cup water
1 1/2 cup no salt added chicken stock (you can do all 3 cups of chicken stock if you’d like to!)

I got the brown rice started on the stove while I prepped the rest of the ingredients. (My favourite way to cook it is on the stove top, even though it’s time consuming. You can definitely cook it using your preferred method.)

1 bag of cooked, deveined and peeled shrimp (I actually found a bag labeled “salad shrimp” so that’s what I got. You can use whatever shrimp you’d like as long as they’re deveined and peeled)
1/2 can of corn kernels (check the ingredients list to make sure there’s nothing else in there but corn and water); drain the water from it
w/2 cup of cooked edamame beans
1 orange bell pepper (you can use any colour you like- I just had this orange one handy and I like the colour)
2 cups of button mushrooms
1 cup of cherry tomatoes
1/2 a medium white onion (chopped)
3 avocados (or however many you’d like)
baby spinach and/or arugula (I couldn’t decide, so I used both)
1 lemon
extra virgin olive oil
1 tsp basil
a tiny pinch of dried rosemary
(optional) cilantro
salt/pepper

Directions:

While brown rice is cooking, prep your veggies (wash, peel, cut, etc.) so that when the rice is done cooking (45 mins), you are good to go.
Take brown rice off heat once it’s cooked
In a large pan on medium heat, pour olive oil and sautée onion until transluscent
Add mushrooms, wait 5 minutes and then add (in order) bell peppers, cherry tomatoes, edamame beans, corn, shrimp
Add salt, pepper, basil and a little dried rosemary (any herb you like will do!)
Turn heat down to low, let simmer for 5 minutes
Place the brown rice in a big mixing bowl and mix the veggies in
Add the juice of 1 fresh lemon and a drizzle of olive oil, salt/pepper to taste
If you are eating it right away: you can add the baby spinach/arugula right away. The salad is just warm enough so that it will wilt a little. Top with sliced avocados and cilantro
If you are meal prepping: Measure your portions in your containers. You will need a ziploc bag for the baby spinach/arugula and the avocado(s). Add both of them to the salad right before you eat it! Otherwise, the avocado will turn brown (yes, even with the acidity of the lemon in there) and the greens will be wilted.

Here are some pics I snapped when I was preparing this:

I bought frozen edamame, defrosted and just peeled them myself (I totally ate a bunch while I was doing it, too)

Some of the veggies prepped and ready to go

Edamame and corn, ready to go! Love these two veggies to snack on.

How my pan looked after I put on the herbs

When everything was in the bowl, I squeezed that lemon, baby!

Added cilantro because it’s my fave. If you don’t like it, you can try parsley!

The finished product, minus the greens! I meal-prepped this, so I will add the greens when I eat them. Added the avocado here because I was already eating it lol

This is a surprisingly filling dish! It has your good carbs, good fats, veggies and protein. If you don’t like shrimp, you can always use chicken breast of salmon – just add them on top (don’t cook them with the veggies.)

For more rice recipes, USA Rice has a great selection on their site here. Just hover over “Recipes” and the options will show you the way. I’m especially curious about using rice as the “dough” for your pizza or these gluten-free brown size espresso brownies (what the heck, right?)

Anyway, I hope this post opened you up to the many possibilities rice can bring to your dinner table (or wherever you eat your food.) If you enjoyed this post, please consider sharing it with your friends! 🙂

Disclosure: USA Rice sent me a $50 gift card to help purchase ingredients for this recipe. All opinions are my own, as usual 🙂

Are you a big fan of rice? Have you tried a rice salad before? How do you like to cook your rice? Let me know in the comments – let’s swap recipes?!