Great Nanny's Dirty Rice

My great grandmother "Great Nanny" was born in Louisiana and passed along all of her Cajun recipes to our family such as gumbo, etouffee, and dirty rice.  Her dirty rice is my absolute FAVORITE side dish that was served at Thanksgiving and Christmas.  I was discussing recipes with some friends over the weekend and they wanted to try this awesome dirty rice I was describing. So here's the recipe.

Ingredients:
1 lb sausage or hamburger meat
2 cans beef broth
2 beef bullion cubes
2 cups water
2 cups rice
Kitchen bouquet (to taste) (I will explain this later)
Onion, celery and bell pepper (to taste)


Directions:
Cut up or dice as much onion, celery and bell pepper as you'd like.  I always have these cut up in bags in my freezer.  That way I can just throw some in the pan and saute them until defrosted and cooked.  I cut larger pieces (instead of dice) because I prefer not to actually eat the onion and bell pepper but you need the flavor!

Then brown your hamburger meat in the same pot.  Once this is done, add all the other ingredients.  It will be very watery but it will cook into something like a rice casserole.  Bring all these ingredients to a boil, reduce the heat to low, cover the pot and cook for 15 minutes or until the liquid is soaked into the rice.

So Kitchen Bouquet is a seasoning / coloring.  It's a little hard to find in the store, you may have to ask but it is worth it.  I use it in my gumbo, roast, or anything beef based.  It's meant to add coloring but it has a flavor that is definitely missed if you don't have it.  I recommend getting it. 

I'll also add some Tony Chachere or cayenne pepper to add some spice to it.

I love this recipe because it takes one pot, takes about 30 minutes or less and it includes meat, starch and vegetables all in the same dish.  We always had it as a side dish in our family but I use it as a main dish around my house.  If I was cooking this today I'd post a pic but I think we're having lasagna tonight.  :)

Happy eating.  Let me know if you try it and what you think!