Rice Bowl Sauces: Mediterranean Olive

Why make just one flavor of rice bowl sauce when you stumble upon a recipe for five? 

Once I surveyed this quintet of delicious options, I set upon a plan to try them all.

Mmm, last night, I slipped off to Italy for a rustic evening meal of grilled sausage, fresh flakes of pecorino cheese, and a medley of summery roasted vegetables, blended together with the warm flavors of olives, lemon and parsley.

Just kidding. I ate this in my back yard. 

But everything else is true and I give this week's rice bowl sauce recipe a definite thumb's up.

My family strongly agrees. Each one of them said this rich, earthy sauce was their favorite so far. For sure, we will have this again.

And now for a word about the rice bowls themselves. 

I feel pretty comfortable riffing on the basic components of what should properly be called a grain bowl. 

Choose a grain. I lean hard on brown rice but quinoa, millet, polenta, amaranth, farro, or orzo pasta are all options.

Add a protein. Tofu, beef, fish, lentils, seafood, eggs, cheese, beans, or pork.

Now ramp up the veggies. Mix color, texture, and raw with cooked. Go with what's in season, and what pairs well together. I like my finished bowl to be at least half vegetables, so I cook more than enough and balance proportions at the table. 

Top it off. Snip some herbs, grate a bit of fresh cheese, chop some nuts, slice up a scallion. A sprinkle of something new adds interest and texture to the very first bite.

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Now, all this grain bowl freelancing is well and good, but sometimes it's fun to try someone else's concotion. I find that other people's grain bowl recipes will lead me to try new ingredients in new combinations, and I usually learn from the experience.

Happily, each of these sauce recipes I'm trying comes paired with a grain bowl recipe, linked at the end of each section of the original post. For the first two sauces, I invented my own grain bowls, based on what sounded good to me slash what I had on hand. 

But for this Mediterranean Olive Sauce, I worked more closely with the paired recipe. True, the recipe was based on polenta - a creamy cornmeal classic from Northern Italy - but I prepared the other ingredients much as suggested, and improvised my way into a happy place. 

Which is one of the truly lovely things about a rice, I mean, grain bowl. Experimentation is the name of the game, and as long as the ingredients are fresh and delicious, every combination will be a delight.

Especially when eaten in the Italian countryside. Or my backyard. 

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Ingredients & Directions:

Combine 1 cup pitted olives, 2 tablespoons olive oil, 2 tablespoons lemon juice, 2 tablespoons water, 1/4 cup fresh parsley leaves, 2 cloves garlic, and 1/4 teaspoon red pepper flakes, then blend until you each your desired consistency. 

from the Kitchn

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I've committed to a month of Rice Bowl Mondays, featuring each of the five sauces in the article. Here you go:

Orange Tahini

Spicy Sriracha Peanut

Mediterranean Olive Sauce

Hoisin Ginger

Herbed Goat Cheese