Authentic Mexican Rice is an essential weeknight dish and every family has its own traditional flavor recipe. My recipe is ready in under 30 minutes without constant monitoring. Use fresh ripe tomatoes, garlic, onion, and spices.
It’s a common side dish in my Mexican cooking and filled with savory flavor, healthy, and delicious! For more rice, try cotija rice and cilantro lime rice.
Naming that Memorable Red Rice
Other names often used for Mexican rice are spanish rice, which makes sense. Then there is arroz rojo, which is red rice in spanish, or often said in a sentence as, una sopa de arroz. I can literally hear my dad saying this. 🙂 LOL
Rice Notes: I personally refer to spanish rice as rice cooked together with meat or seafood and a bit softer in texture. But I don’t dissect someone’s description of it, I just figure out what they mean between the flavor! Just throwing it out there incase anyone else feels conflicted, you are not alone.
What’s your favorite way to eat rice? Be sure to let us know in the comments below!
Ingredients in Mexican Rice
Ingredient Quick List: rice, water, broth, tomatoes for fresh (or canned sauce) carrots, potato, peas, onion, garlic, and salt (or bouillon, or DIY spice blend).
- Rice
- Oil
- Water / Chicken Broth
- Onion
- Garlic
- Tomato
- Basic spices
- Vegetables of choice
Ingredient Notes / Variations
- Rice – long grain rice is the essential for this one but do not stray from other delicious variety. Basmati rice is delicious fluffy rice type. This is almost a dream from rice with dinner.
- Rinsing the rice until water is clear is recommended.
- Avoid soaking all together and just rinse. If you do soak the rice, no more than a couple (2) minutes.
- Tomatoes – make from homemade sauce or pantry tomato sauce, can both be used. This recipe will share how I make the tomato sauce from scratch.
- If you’re short on time or have no tomatoes on hand, use canned sauce (I do it too!). It will still be delicious.
- I boil the tomatoes before making the sauce for the rice. If you go straight from raw tomato blend, this is an option but just be sure to select ripe and possibly soft to touch tomate.
- Homemade Mexican spice blend and salt, or preferred bouillon of choice.
- Onion and substitutions – White onion is the preferred choice for making this rice for its strong and spicy flavor. Brown and red, can be used to make this recipe. Use what you have on hand, I’m happy to show you ways to pull it off.
- Whole pieces or minced are always option. But do keep in mind that this adds moisture to the rice.
- Fresh Garlic always, if you have access to it, please do! We use the garlics cloves and allow them to release all their flavor in the rice as it cooks out.
- Garlic powder is a good substitute for picky eaters who notice the hidden aromatic (veggie). Use 1 teaspoon.
Garlic flavor tip! If you want maximum benefits of eating garlic in the rice, blend whole cloves into the sauce and pour onto the rice for extra garlicky rice.
Step-By-Step Instructions
To make the rice recipe:
- Wash tomatoes and cook tomatoes if making rice sauce from scratch. Prep any veggies for the dish.
- Measure and rinse the rice needed.
- Heat pan, add oil and let warm, after about a minute, add rice grains and stir them in frequently so entirely coated in the small amount of oil.
- Now that rice is toasted, add tomato sauce along with broth/water.
- Add spices and veggies and cover and cook on medium until ready to eat.
A printer-friendly recipe card with instructions is available at the bottom of this post.
Ways To Spice It Up
I love the hint of spice that makes this authentic Mexican rice complete. There’s a lot of beef with jalapeno’s these days here in CA, so just use a serrano.
Fresh serrano or jalapeno chile pepper. Drop a fresh washed green spicy pepper into the pot of rice during step 3 of “to cook the rice” in the recipe card.
Foods To Eat With Mexican Rice
Wondering what to serve with rice? Here are a few favorite ways we pair our rice to soak up all the good comidas..
- Crispy Potato Tacos (Shortcut in rice: potatoes are already cooked)
- Calabacitas Recipe
- Milanesa Steak
- Nopales (Preparados)
Need a bigger pot of rice? Here’s the Party Rice Recipe.
Ways To Flip [Mexican Rice]
Make delicious foods out of leftover rice. It’s a great addition to the following easy-to-make favorites.
- BRC
- Mexican Chicken Soup
- Chicken and Rice Bowls
- Easy Veggie Style Mulitas
Pro Tips / Receta Notes
Recipe yield: 3 cups cooked rice.
Storage: Keep any remaining rice in airtight storage with lid to prevent drying it out. Rice always taste best fresh but will last up to 6-7 days in refrigeration.
Reheating: To reheat a portion of rice, add one teaspoon of water to rice and heat on medium/low covered.
If you’re all out of a broth and plan to use a bouillon, you can use all water. It won’t taste like this recipe intends, but will still get the rice done. The more broth, the richer the flavor!
Make with your favorite bouillon flavor and selected veggies.
Tomato sauce, if you use salted canned tomato sauce, hold back on the amount of salt used. If you are using salted tomato sauce, use 1/2 tsp of salt and no bouillon or vice versa. Careful not to over-salt your rice.
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Traditional Mexican Rice Recipe
DESCRIPTION
Equipment
- Large pan
- Pan safe utensil
- Blender (if using fresh tomatoes)
Ingredients
- 1 cup long grain rice
- 3 cups water (1 cup is used when making your own tomato sauce, reduce to 2 cups if using canned sauce)
- 2 medium ripe roma tomatoes (or, 5 oz of canned tomato sauce, unsalted)
- 1 cup broth – regular or low sodium (homemade or canned)
- 1 tbsp olive oil
- 2 – 3 garlic cloves
- 1 large carrot washed, peeled and diced to your liking
- 1/4 cup frozen peas or corn, or both
- 2-3 red or gold potatoes washed: small whole, or medium halved
For seasoning the rice
- 1 tsp kosher salt or 3/4 tsp sea salt; or bouillon of choice; or DIY spice blend.
DIY spice blend
- 1/4 tsp ground cumin
- 1/4 tsp dried parsley flakes
- 1/8 tsp turmeric powder
- 1/4 tsp paprika
Instructions
For the red Mexican rice sauce
- Cut roma tomatoes in half (or quarters) and place them in a pot with 1 cup of water. Cover with lid and allow the tomatoes to boil on medium / high for about 8-10 minutes.
- Once tomatoes have cooked, pierce tomatoes through with a fork to ensure they are fully cooked and soft enough to liquefy (cutting them allows for a quicker cook time).
- Carefully transfer tomatoes with their remaining water along with into a blender and liquefy. Set liquefied sauce to side.
To make the rice
- Peel 2-3 garlic cloves and cut ¼ onion, set to side. Prepare preferred veggies.
- Place a large saute pan over medium flame, add oil and let heat for about 2-3 minutes.
- Add onion and garlic to pan, followed by dry rice. Stir contents often in pan until all is lightly coated with oil and toasted. About 1-2 minutes on medium low heat.
- Pour one cup of chicken or veggie broth, 2 cups water, tomato sauce and 1 tsp kosher salt or 3/4 tsp sea salt (OR, bouillon or our DIY spice blend), stir in well. Distribute freshly cut carrots and potatoes throughout the pan and place the lid over the pan. Allow cook on medium heat for the next 15 minutes.
- Check rice, add preferred frozen peas / corn / green beans then return lid to cover for last 3-5 minutes.
- When finished. Tilt lid to naturally release heat from pan for 5 minutes or leave covered for 5 even softer rice.
Notes
- Recipe yield: 3 cups cooked rice, 6 – 4 ounce servings.
- Storage: Keep any remaining rice in airtight storage with lid to prevent drying it out. To reheat a portion of rice, add one teaspoon of water to rice and heat on medium/low.
- Garlic powder substitution: 1 teaspoon instead of fresh garlic for picky eaters.
- If you’re all out of broth and plan to use a bouillon, you can use all water. It won’t taste like this recipe, but it’ll still get the rice done with your favorite bouillon flavor and selected veggies.
- Important Note: When Doubling the Rice Recipe, the full can of tomato sauce is used. Please reduce the amount of water that is called for by 1 cup for every cup of uncooked rice. The 3rd Cup of water used is required ONLY when you are making your own sauce. I want your rice to come out perfect so please keep this in mind incase something looks off!
- Canned Tomato sauce, if you use salted canned tomato sauce, hold back on the amount of salt used. When using salted sauce, I use 1/2 tsp of salt and no bouillon or vice versa. Taste the broth as you mix the salt well into the pot to make sure it’s salted to your liking then cover to allow rice to cook.
- Hint of spice – Serrano Chile Pepper or Jalapeno, simply drop a fresh washed chile pepper of your choice to the pot of rice during same step as broth (step 3 of “to cook the rice”). We Love the hint of spice that makes this authentic Mexican rice complete.
To view the full post with full tips please visit the LatinasQueComen.com website. Please star rate this recipe! Thank you for your support.
Nutrition
Equipment
- Large pan with lid
- Pan safe utensil
- Blender (if using fresh tomatoes)
- Can opener (if using canned sauce)
- Knife
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