Roman-style rice stuffed tomatoes, with raw rice, a typical Roman dish, easy and quick to prepare, delicious served cold, or even lukewarm, are one of the most classic summer dishes of not only Roman but Italian summer. My mom used to make them often when I was a girl, now it’s been a while since I last tasted them, and I ventured into this preparation, with great success on the first attempt, so really easy to prepare, even if you’re not very experienced. What do you need to make rice stuffed tomatoes, obviously some tomatoes, round red, but very firm, be careful not to choose ones that are too ripe as they may crack during cooking, they’re just as tasty, but perhaps not as pretty to present at the table. The second ingredient is rice, you need a good rice that holds the long cooking time, from 45 to 60 minutes in the oven, I chose salad rice, a parboiled one, and I must say that the choice was spot on, the grains were cooked just right, and especially well-separated from each other, without becoming a single mush. The seasoning will give flavor to our rice in the tomato, so use all the herbs indicated, garlic included. The peculiarity of this dish is that the rice is used raw. It’s a dish that is prepared in several simple and quick phases, so it’s good to start preparing it a little in advance, also because it’s ideal served cold or lukewarm, so also account for cooling time. The first phase involves emptying the tomatoes, and with the extracted pulp, the rice is seasoned, along with the other seasonings, then left to rest for at least 90 minutes, and then proceed to fill the tomatoes and cook them on a bed of potatoes and onions. The longer the rice rests in the tomato juice, the tastier the rice stuffed tomatoes will be.
And now let’s go to the kitchen to prepare rice stuffed tomatoes.
- Difficulty: Very easy
- Cost: Very economical
- Rest time: 1 Hour 30 Minutes
- Preparation time: 20 Minutes
- Portions: 4
- Cooking methods: Oven
- Cuisine: Italian
- Seasonality: Summer
Ingredients for Roman-style rice stuffed tomatoes, raw with baked potatoes
- 8 tomatoes, ripe, fresh
- 9 tablespoons parboiled rice
- 10 leaves basil
- 1 bunch parsley
- to taste dried oregano
- 1 clove garlic
- to taste salt
- to taste olive oil
- 28 oz potatoes
- 1 onion
Tools to prepare raw rice stuffed tomatoes that cook directly in the oven
- 1 Knife
- 1 Cutting board
- 1 Spoon
- 1 Bowl 1
- 1 Chopper
- 1 Baking tray
- 1 Baking paper
Steps for rice stuffed tomatoes
Wash the tomatoes, with a knife cut the top, empty them of the pulp, first helping with a knife, then with a teaspoon, and let the tomatoes drain upside down on a tray, with each tomato next to its top, which we will use later to close our tomatoes.
With a food processor, blend the tomato pulp with dried oregano, parsley, basil, garlic with the central part removed, salt, and black pepper.
Add the rice to the tomato juice and let it rest for at least 90 minutes in the fridge. The longer the rice rests with its seasoning, the tastier it will be.
After the resting period, prepare the potatoes, peel them, cut them into wedges, and wash them, season with oil, salt, and oregano, and place on a baking tray lined with parchment paper. Add an onion cut into wedges.
At this point, place the tomatoes next to the potatoes, and fill them with the rice, up to almost the edge, with about 1 1/2 tablespoons of rice, a little more. Cover with each top that we removed at the beginning, drizzle with a bit of olive oil and a pinch of salt, and bake for about 45-60 minutes in a ventilated oven at 375°F. If necessary, adjust the temperature of your oven differently. If you see the tomatoes or potatoes are already well-browned before time, lower the oven temperature slightly. Let them cool before serving, at room temperature, or even cold from the fridge.
Roman-style rice stuffed tomatoes can be kept for 2 or 3 days in the fridge, they can also be frozen once cooked.
If you want to make your rice stuffed tomatoes tastier, you can add tuna in oil, or cheese, even smoked provola goes well, in this case, you can omit the additional tablespoon of rice, one is enough for each tomato.
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