This recipe was born when my friend Julien and I adapted his zucchini gratin recipe to make a vegan version. His recipe consists of jasmine rice mixed with shredded zucchini and lightly sauteed shredded carrots, topped with cheese and baked.
He made some for me without cheese, and I loved it and tweaked the recipe a bit, adding some roasted garlic and vegan parm on top for extra flavor. (I also don’t saute the carrots because I can’t be bothered with the extra step.)
Zucchini rice is great as a main dish or along with beans, potatoes, or other veggies. If you’re a rice lover like me, this recipe is a great way to get some extra veggies in too.
It’s definitely easier to make this if you have a food processor with a shredder attachment, but if you don’t have one, you could use a grater to shred the veggies.
This recipe is versatile–it’s great with brown rice as well, and you could leave out the onion and garlic if you want or add in vegan parm or nooch to the rice mixture before baking. If you want to make something closer to typical zucchini gratin, you could also top it with vegan cheese shreds.
If you make it, please let me know in the comments and/or post a photo on Instagram and tag me (@pennysportal)!
Easy Zucchini Rice
Ingredients
- 1 3/4 cup water
- 1 cup jasmine rice
- 3 medium zucchinis
- 2 medium carrots
- 1/2 white or yellow onion
- 3 cloves garlic
- 1 teaspoon salt & pepper or to taste
- Optional: More garlic for roasting vegan parm or other vegan cheese, nutritional yeast
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 375 degrees.
- To cook the rice: Add rice and water to a pot and bring to a boil, then turn it down to medium and continue cooking until water evaporates (about 8-10 minutes), stirring occasionally. Alternatively, cook rice in a rice cooker, Instant Pot, or other preferred method.
- While waiting for the water for the rice to boil/rice to cook, prepare the zucchini mixture: Rinse off the zucchini and carrots and chop off ends. Peel the onion and 3 cloves of garlic (don't peel the rest of the garlic for roasting.)
- Shred the zucchini and carrots in a food processor using the shredder disc. Put shredded zucchini and carrots aside in a large bowl.
- Switch from the shredder disc to the chopper blade. Add the onion and 3 peeled garlic cloves to the food processor and pulse until lightly chopped. Add chopped onion and garlic to the bowl with zucchini and carrots.
- When the rice is done cooking, add it to the bowl with the zucchini mixture and salt and pepper and mix everything together. Add the mixture to a 9x12" baking dish (or something similar in size).
- Optional: Top with a layer of vegan parm or other vegan cheese.
- Place the rest of the garlic on a baking sheet, leaving the skin on the cloves.
- Put the rice and tray of garlic in the oven. Bake the garlic for 15 minutes and the rice for 30 minutes, broiling the rice for the last couple of minutes, watching carefully so it doesn't burn. Peel the garlic once it's cooled.
- Top the rice with roasted garlic and more vegan parm or nutritional yeast and serve.
Notes
For a nut free version, top with nutritional yeast instead of vegan parm.
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