Restaurant Style Mexican Rice (2024)

Restaurant style Mexican rice at home! Two secret ingredients make it easy and delicious (pssst! It’s canned tomatoes with chilies and sazon seasoning – secret’s out!).

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Restaurant Style Mexican Rice

Are you one of those people who like the rice and beans more than the main dish when you go out for Mexican food? It’s easy to see why. They’re homey, filling, comforting side dishes packed with flavor! It’s also easy to make them both at home. All you need to do is grab a few pantry items and a do a little chopping! Let’s start with the rice. Restaurant style Mexican rice is savory, tender and a little spicy, it’s addictive.

But how do you get that flavor and color that they get in the restaurant? Two secret ingredients: a can of Rotel tomatoes with chilies, and a packet of sazon seasoning!

The Ingredients

Let’s start with the rice. Any kind of long grain rice works well for making Mexican rice. You can use generic “long grain rice”, or basmati, or jasmine, anything like that. If you prefer long grain brown rice, you can also use that, but you’ll have to up the cooking time from 15 minutes to about 45 minutes.

To add lots of flavor, you’ll chop some onion, garlic, and (optional) a jalapeno. The jalapeno doesn’t add a lot of heat once it simmers with the rice, but it does add great taste. Give it a try! If you like your food spicy, add two jalapenos, or if you’re feeling feisty, a serrano pepper.

Next, for the liquid I like to use chicken stock, but you can also use water or vegetable stock if you want to make this a vegetarian dish. Here’s where secret ingredient number one comes into play. That can of diced tomatoes with chilies. When you add the them, you’ll also add the juice from the can, and this will be part of your cooking liquid for the rice. As far as the heat level goes in the chilies, they’re not too spicy, but you’ll be adding that flavor you expect from restaurant style Mexican rice.

Now, about that other secret ingredient, the sazon…..

Sazon You Say?

Did you happen to notice that pretty orange package in the ingredient photo? That is sazon, and it’s an amazing seasoning blend. The word sazon means seasoning in Spanish, and it’s very popular in Latin cooking. You can find recipes to make your own homemade blends, but I usually use the premade sazon from Goya brand. It has has coriander, garlic, cumin and it’s most magical ingredient, ground annotto seeds. The annotto (or achiote in Spanish) is what gives the rice the beautiful yellow/orange color. It’s similar to how saffron is used in Spanish cooking, but it’s much less expensive. Make sure you buy the sazon that lists annotto so you get the color (and flavor, of course).

Now, there is a controversial ingredient in the store bought sazon, MSG (monosodium glutamate). I don’t have a problem with it, it’s a flavor enhancer like salt, but if you do, you can make your own blend, or buy a brand without it. And the sazon is not a one tricky pony. You can also use it in arroz con pollo (chicken and rice!), as a rub on chicken wings or legs before you roast them, in a stew, as a seasoning in lentils, and more! Try it.

Making the Rice

To make the restaurant style Mexican rice, you’ll first saute the veggies (onion, jalapeno and garlic) in oil with a little salt. Next you’ll saute the rice! This might sound weird, but this is a technique used for rice pilaf recipes, and it will give it an extra toasty flavor. Some say sautéing the rice will also coat the grains in oil, which helps to keep them separate as they cook.

Once the veggies and rice are sautéed, you’ll add the rest of the ingredients (broth, canned tomatoes with chili, and sazon) to the pan and simmer until all that flavor soaks into the rice (only 15 minutes!). Finally, you’ll uncover your rice, take a deep breath of that delicious scent, fluff it with a fork and serve it to your overjoyed loved ones (or just yourself).

Make a Bowl!

As long as you’re make the rice, why not also make the beans? You won’t believe how easy it is. Click here to get the recipe for enchilada style refried beans. Once the rice and beans are ready, you can make a delicious main dish Mexican bowl. I like to add white onion, black olives (old school!), cilantro and avocado. It would also be delicious with grilled chicken or steak!

Make a Taco!

Yep, that’s right, rice and beans also make great tacos! Just warm your favorite corn or flour tortillas, fill with beans, then shredded cheese (so the heat of the beans melts the cheese), then rice, avocado, onion and salsa. It’s carb on carb on carb goodness.

p.s. – I like to keep the tortillas in a tortilla warmer! You can either toast the tortillas on the stove then add to the warmer, or put the stack of tortillas in the warmer and microwave them.

Make Some Soup!

I love chicken and rice soup, who doesn’t? You can add a scoop of your restaurant style Mexican rice to your soup bowl, then ladle in chicken vegetable soup! Add your favorite fiesta toppings and a squeeze of lime and you’ve got delicious Mexican chicken rice soup.

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