Oh, wild rice! Where have you been my whole life?
I’m a decent cook, but I’m embarrassed to admit that until a few weeks ago, I was a wild-rice virgin. I can’t exactly explain why, except that I’d never eaten wild rice, nor was interested in preparing wild rice. I was ignorant about its culinary diversity and attributes. Frankly, I put wild rice in the same category as lentils, another food that I’ve never bonded with, nor liked. I’d seen wild rice in stores, and it looked about as appetizing as hundreds of tiny pencil leads.
It was during a recent holiday potluck gathering where I first tasted a cold wild rice salad that transformed me into an enthusiastic wild rice convert. I wasn’t the only party-goer smitten by the colorful wild rice salad, something placed on the table among holiday sweets and appetizers, where, normally, holiday treats and appetizers would have easily outcompeted a salad. But this was no ordinary salad. It was chilled, and studded with colorful dried cranberries and canned Mandarin oranges, as well with diced tomatoes and other ingredients, topped with a tangy dressing.
By the end of the party all that remained of the wild rice salad was an empty bowl and pleas from guests for the recipe. I got the recipe, provided by the salad’s creator, none other than former Shasta County District 3 Supervisor Mary Rickert.
Former Shasta County Dist. 3 Supervisor Mary Rickert.
In addition to being a dedicated community servant, rancher, and former elected official, Rickert has extremely close ties with world of wild-rice growing, promotion, production and sales. She and husband Jim have been growing wild rice since 1982, and along with another farmer, they were the first growers to grow wild rice in the Fall River Valley. The Rickerts founded the Fall River Wild Rice Co-op, and their wild rice is sold worldwide.
Rickert, not just a wild-rice grower but a wild rice expert, imparted some wild-rice wisdom. First, she said that wild rice is actually a grain, not a rice. Also, Rickert said that wild rice is an extremely nutrient rich food that contains a great deal of fiber.
“Its nutty taste and texture makes it very popular,” Rickert said. “It can be used in many different kinds of dishes, such as salads, soups, as a side dish and even in Jell-O.”
Jell-O? Really? OK, if she says so.
According to the Fall River Wild Rice webpage, wild rice has been –and continues to be — a staple of several Native American tribes. It was called “manoomin”, which means “precious grain”.
More from the website: “Wild rice really isn’t rice at all. In fact, it’s the seed of Zizania palustris, a tall, blooming water grass that prospers in shallow lakes, marshes and streams. It is the only cereal grain native to the North American continent. Wild rice is grown in the clean, clear waters of the Great Lakes region and in the fruitful western valleys in the shadow of the Sierra Nevada’s and the Cascade Mountains.”
The Fall River Wild Rice webpage offers recipes, and opportunities for the purchase of its various wild rice products.
The popular party recipe
Aside from what I now know about the nutritional benefits of wild rice, a few things appealed to me regarding Rickert’s party-favorite Wild Rice and Cranberry Salad. First, it’s delicious, and has a variety of tastes and textures. Second, it’s pretty, and is a nice way to introduce a gorgeous salad into a fancy holiday dinner, something a tossed green salad never fully accomplishes. Third, it’s easy. Finally, it’s perfect for people who are gluten intolerant, and those who are vegetarian. (Vegetarians can just swap out the chicken bouillon with a vegetable-based bouillon.)
Rickert’s recipe surprised me, for a few reasons. For one thing, the salad is so complex that when eating it, I didn’t notice the tomatoes or cheese in the salad. Although I found the salad delicious, I was already making mental adjustments to suit my own taste, starting with omitting the diced tomatoes and cheese cubes. Instead, for my version — served in a cut-glass bowl on Christmas Eve with a prime rib, popovers and mashed potatoes — I added diced apple and pecans. I also doubled the quantity of Mandarin oranges, and also doubled the amount of cranberries.
These revisions explain why, in the photo, above, the wild rice appears merely a vehicle for the colorful ingredients that makes this salad something that can stay stable refrigerated safely for many days. I believe the tomatoes and cheese would have caused the salad to get a more mushy texture.
Another thing that surprised me about Rickert’s recipe is that it used a prepared salad dressing, specifically, Girard’s Champagne Vinaigrette, which Rickert prefers, and not just because she has a brother named Girard.
One word of caution: Go easy on the salad dressing. A little goes a long way, and you can always add more, if needed.
Finally, the most surprising aspect of Rickert’s recipe is that she bakes the rice (along with water and two chicken bouillon cubes), in a heavy Dutch oven, rather than cooking it on the stovetop, or using precooked wild rice.
As the wild rice bakes, it emits a rich nutty aroma, and once finished, all those little black grains have burst into something that looks more like, well, rice, than a grain.
According to Rickert, baking the wild rice is the key to wild-rice success. Although her original recipe calls for Fall River Fully Cooked Wild Rice, Rickert deviates from the recipe by using the dried grains, and baking them in the oven with the water and two chicken bouillon cubes.
If you decide to go the route of using pre-cooked wild rice (no shame there), skip the steps where the wild rice is baked. Instead, add all the ingredients to a single 16-ounce pouch of pre-cooked wild rice, and chill everything in the refrigerator.
“Baking, if done correctly, results in great wild rice,” Rickert said. “It’s an acquired taste, plus, one needs to know how to cook it. You now hold the secret on how to achieve that.”
And now, you have the secret, too.
Mary Rickert’s Wild & Easy Wild Rice & Cranberry Salad
1 cup uncooked wild rice
3 cups water
2 chicken bouillon cubes (or powdered equivalent)
Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Rinse and strain the wild rice well.
Dissolve the bouillon cubes into one of the cups of water. (Rickert puts one of the cups of water in the microwave with the bouillon.) Place the cup of dissolved bouillon into a large oven-proof pot/Dutch oven along with the rice and the remaining the water. Cover with a lid. Bake in the center of the oven for 1 and a half hours, making sure all the water is absorbed. Place in colander, and pat dry with a paper towel to remove excess water.
(Note: Rickert uses 3 cups of water for every 1 cup of uncooked wild rice.)
Refrigerate the cooked wild rice. Now progress to the other ingredients:
2 medium tomatoes, diced
4 green onions, chopped, including tops
3/4 cup dried cranberries, finely chopped
1 small can Mandarin oranges, drained
1/2 cup mozzarella cheese, cut into 1/-inch cubes
Girard’s Champagne Salad Dressing, to taste
Salt and pepper, to taste
Doni’s optional ingredients: 1 cup diced peeled apple, 1 cup chopped pecans, 1/2 cup freshly chopped curly parsley.
Combine all ingredients. Refrigerate. Stays fresh for many days. Serves 8
Note: This recipe is sponsored by Redding Grocery Outlet Bargain Markets on Churn Creek Road and Eureka Way in Redding. Some of the following ingredients were purchased at the Redding Grocery Outlet Bargain Market, and used in the above recipe.
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