Tomato Rice | Easy lunchbox recipes

For the third week in this Blogging Marathon, I have chosen to blog about lunch box dishes for kids. I have heard from many mothers that packing lunch boxes for children is a very big challenge. Kids these days love variety and they want to feel surprised when they open their lunch boxes.

The biggest challenge in packing lunch boxes is that the recipe should be something the kid likes. And the next one is that it should be easy to make during the morning rush hour. In this post I have posted photos of how I packed tomato rice for the lunch box. Generally kids hate tomatoes. I have seen this in a lot of kids. But they enjoy the taste. So I grind tomatoes and onions to make this rice. 

I packed the tomato rice with gobi manchurian, papads and curd. I also added a boiled egg to make the lunch more interesting. The other option would be to pack this rice with lots of fryums and fried potatoes.

The recipe of gobi manchurian is given here.

Ingredients:

Jeera rice - 2 cups (200 grams)

Tomato - 150 grams

Onions - 100 grams

Ginger - 5 grams

Garlic - 5 grams

Green chillies - 2 nos (small)

Salt - to taste

Garam masala powder - 1/2 tsp

Turmeric powder - 1/2 tsp
Oil - 2 tbsp
Coriander powder - 1 tsp
Chilly powder - 1/2 tsp
Coriander leaves - few

Method:

• Wash the rice and keep aside.
• Grind the onions, tomatoes, green chillies, ginger, garlic into a coarse paste.
• In a pressure cooker, add the oil. Add the ground paste and fry until the water is completely evaporated and the ground mixture becomes a thick paste.
• Add the washed rice and throw in all the powders including salt.
• Fry for another one or two minutes.
• Add the required amount of water (1:2 ratio).
• Mix well. Check for salt. Close the pressure cooker.
• Cook for one pressure. Then bring doen the heat to minimum. Cook for another minute and switch off the stove.
• Open the pressure cooker as soon as the pressure is released and transfer the contents to a wide mouthed bowl.
• Garnish with coriander leaves.

Notes:

• The tomato rice will be more flavorful if made with basmati rice.
• To make it more attractive to kids, garnish it with fried cashewnuts.

Check out the Blogging Marathon page for the other Blogging Marathoners doing this BM#78