Don’t be put off by the title this is a seriously easy and very cheap dish and I am going to use the basis of this to make many more lovely things! This is why I love getting new cook books as they teach me new ways of doing things and give me ideas. Even though this is essentially someone elses recipe ( I just thought it too good not to share!!) it will be the base of a few more of my inventions starting with a lamb keema biriyani ( watch this space!) I never knew you could cook rice like this but I am going to be doing it a lot! I always find it tricky to get rice perfect.

I ate this on its own but I could also be used as a side dish. I have adjusted the ingredients slightly from the book as I thought there was too much cinnamon.

Ingredients
Serves 4 as a main

800g cherry tomatoes
12 large peeled Garlic cloves roughly chopped
4 Banana Shallots, peeled and chopped into chunks
25g Corriander roughly chopped
3 tbsp – fresh Thyme leaves
1 large Cinnamon stick
100ml Olive oil
300g Basmati rice ( I always use Tilda)
600ml boiling water
Salt and pepper

Put the whole cherry tomatoes, garlic, shallot , thyme and cinnamon in a baking dish with high sides then pour over the olive oil and season with salt and black pepper. Cook for around 1 hour at 160 degrees fan until soft then remove from the oven.

Turn the oven up to 220 degree fan.

Without breaking up the tomatoes put the uncooked rice on top, season again with salt and pepper and add the boiling water. Seal the dish tightly with foil and bake in the oven for around 25 minutes until the rice is cooked. Take out of the oven and leave covered for 10 minutes then remove the foil and sprinkle with corrainder, stir gently and serve!