Topic: Using powdered food colouring

[Stephen Lindsay]

Just to add to the debate.

For yellow rice, I boil a separate batch and add a teaspoon or two of turmeric into the water, then drain it off as usual.

For red rice I add red powdered colouring to cold, dry boiled rice. I separate off a portion of white rice in a bowl, mix in the colouring, then keep it separate from the other rice till close to serving so that it does not bleed into the rice.

Some places in Scotland do green bits as well but I never have any of that colour.

Mix all colours at the last minute and heat in the micro.

[Razor]

And to add my two-penneth,

I add 0.25 tsp of red, yellow and orange in separate pots, 1 tsp of water in each, mix well.  Then, I use a 'dropper' and add a dropper full, applied in a straight line, to the fried/boiled rice, place the lid back on and put in the oven, gas Mk 3 for 15 mins, to lock the colours.  Take out of the oven, remove any whole spices and fluff up the rice, to distribute evenly.

This is very similar to the KD method, who's pilau rice is wonderful IMO.

Ray

[curryhell]

Thanks for contributing your methods guys.  The more input the better.  Nothing like keeping one's options open ;D.  Must admit, whilst having followed some of KD's recipes and having adapted her curry gravy to my taste, i have never tried her rice.  I am more than happy with my recipe which has come from dissecting the rice from the local BIR takeaway years ago to determine what was in it and then getting the balance of the spices right.  I am more than happy that my rice is as good as any average takeaway.  I haven't had any complaints about it yet .   And compared to some that i have been served, it's a damn sight better .  Green bits are not unique to Scotland Stephen.  They have found their way down south too.  Personally, i think red, orange and yellow is sufficient colouring.  Not quite sure what the green adds .  But each to their own.  To answer your ? Natterjak, i use the back of the handle of a cheap pressed steel egg spoon which is quite small and very square.  Ideal for measuring.  In the unlikely event of you having such a thing ;D an easy way of measuring minute quantities of food colouring powder would be to use the tip of a cocktail stick, a very versatile little tool .  Of course you could always use the tip of a thin bladed pointed knife.

[loveitspicy]

How do you manage to get such a tiny amount from the bottle onto the top of the rice?  A normal teaspoon would appear to be far too large for such a task.

You could use the end of a toothpick -

[loveitspicy]

You could use the end of a toothpick - when you dig that in the colour it forms a tiny pile on the end

[Stephen Lindsay]

I'm a bit like you curryhell - I don't tend to add green stuff to my rice.

[curryhell]

But if i do get any special requests for green bits in the rice, of course i'm always happy to oblige, just like the colouring of CTM.  Some like it bright red, some like it pink.  Whatever floats your boat ;D