Best Homemade Gluten Free Spanish Rice

 In our house, tacos seem to always make it onto the menu every week. Kind of like taco Tuesday…. only its taco whenever it fits in the schedule day! Whenever it’s taco night, I always make a big batch of homemade gluten free Spanish rice to go with it!

In our house, we love Mexican food. It is something we could eat almost every night and everyone will love it. In fact, it is on my “go to” list for when I just don’t know what to make and everyone is staring at me for a meal. Check out my post on how to make a meal plan for the week.

But most of the boxed Spanish rice at the grocery store, is not gluten free. Not to mention, we don’t really care for the taste of them.

So, like most everything in my kitchen, when I can’t find what I want I go on a hunt to make it on my own! I have gotten real good at this being on a gluten-free diet for so long now. Dietary restrictions will make you think outside the box a lot!

I love this Spanish rice recipe because it uses real simple ingredients, and you probably have all that you need in your pantry.

This homemade gluten free Spanish rice recipe is as close to a Mexican restaurants rice as I could get. It is so good and not spicy, so the kids love it too!

What real ingredients are in this homemade gluten free Spanish rice recipe?

Using real tomatoes in this recipe makes the dish so delicious. I love it when my summer garden is in full swing and I can just go out my back door to grab the tomatoes that I need! There really is nothing like farm fresh tomatoes in all your recipes. If you don’t have fresh tomatoes on hand, just use tomato sauce.

Lately, I have been using a couple scoop fulls of my blended dehydrated tomato powder from the garden in place of the tomatoes. I share how I dehydrate my tomatoes from the garden as a way to preserve them, in this post on my top 3 ways to preserve tomatoes. It has worked wonderful and given delicious flavor. So really you can use so many different variations to get the same amazing taste!

I also use chicken bone broth, which gives the rice some added health benefits! Sneaking bone broth into all kinds of recipes is a must on the homestead.

Make sure to check out how I make my own super immune boosting healthy bone broth and also how I pressure can my bone broth to be ready to use in all sorts of recipes.

If you don’t have bone broth made up, you can use canned chicken broth from the store. 

Ingredients:

• 1/4 cup avocado oil or olive oil
• 1/4 cup diced onions
• 2 cloves minced garlic
• 1 1/2 cup white rice or brown rice
• 3 1/4 cups chicken bone broth or chicken stock
• 1/2 tsp paprika
• 2 1/2 tsp salt
• 1 pinch oregano
• 1 pinch parsley
• 1/3 cup pureed tomatoes about 1 large Roma tomato

How to make homemade gluten free Spanish rice.

1. Put oil, diced onion and minced garlic into a medium saucepan or large dutch oven and turn your stovetop on medium heat. Sauté onion and garlic for 2 minutes or until golden brown.
2. Add in 1.5 cups of rice and cook for another 2 minutes or until rice is lightly golden brown.
3. Take your diced tomatoes and throw them in a blender or food processor to puree.
4. Pour in chicken bone broth, spices, and pureed tomatoes (or tomato sauce/dehydrated tomato powder if using) to your pot. Stir and bring it all to a boil.
5. Reduce heat and cover. Cook for 20-25 minutes or until your rice cooks all the way. Cooking times will vary.

A crowd-pleasing side dish!

This recipe is an easy side dish that doubles or even triples well. This makes it the perfect side dish to feed a crowd. In fact I believe I brought a quadrupled batch to a church function not long ago.

The best part about it, it’s not spicy so even kids love it! I love a good easy recipe that the kids love and that can feed a crowd.

We love to eat this Spanish rice as a side to fajitas or tacos, in burrito bowls, or left over as a stir fry with veggies and meat. The possibilities are endless with this delicious rice recipe.

So gather your family around your dinner table for taco night and add this delicious Mexican rice as your side dish. Your family will thank you for it and ask you to make it time and time again!

Other Gluten Free Favorite Sides We Love:

Rice a Roni

Scalloped Potatoes

Cornbread