Delia Smith’s brown and wild rice salad cooks the two rices in separate pans, dresses them warm in a Champagne vinegar and mustard dressing, then folds in dried cranberries, toasted walnuts, apple, tomato, cucumber, pepper and spring onions. It serves 6 and takes a little over 2 hours, most of it cooking and cooling.
She first wrote it for the cold buffet in How to Cook Book Three (2001), a menu for 12 that can all be made ahead, beside a curried turkey salad, mini Yorkshire puddings with rare beef and Thai pork satays. A year later her Vegetarian Collection cut it down to serve 6, and that’s the version on the card.
Wild rice isn’t really rice at all but the seed of a grass from North America, with long, shiny black grains and a smoky, nutty taste. Mixed with brown basmati, red cranberries and golden walnuts, it makes a bright, many-coloured bowl that tastes chewy, sweet and sharp at once.
Delia Smith’s Brown and Wild Rice Salad
Delia’s Vegetarian Collection (2002) version, page 45, sized for 6, with brown basmati and wild rice cooked side by side. The ingredients are dried cranberries, walnuts, crisp vegetables and a sharp Champagne vinegar dressing.
6
servings1
hour25
minutes50
minutes220
kcalIngredients
- For the salad:
120ml (4fl oz) brown basmati rice, measured in a jug
55ml (2fl oz) wild rice, measured in a jug
1 dessertspoon groundnut or other flavourless oil
25g (1oz) dried cranberries
25g (1oz) walnuts, roughly chopped
2 medium ripe red tomatoes
4cm (1½in) piece cucumber, cut into small dice, unpeeled
½ small red or yellow pepper, deseeded and diced
1 small red-skinned dessert apple, washed, cored and finely chopped
2 spring onions, finely chopped, green parts included
salt and freshly ground black pepper
- For the dressing:
1 small clove garlic, peeled
½ teaspoon sea salt
½ teaspoon mustard powder
1½ tablespoons Champagne vinegar, or good white wine vinegar
3 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
freshly ground black pepper
Directions
- Oven: Preheat the oven to 180°C, fan 160°C, gas mark 4, for the walnuts.
- Wild rice: Heat half the oil in a small heavy-based frying pan, add the wild rice and toss to coat the grains. Pour in 120ml (4fl oz) of boiling water, add a little salt, stir once, cover with a tight-fitting lid and cook over a gentle heat for 50 minutes.
- Brown rice: Do the same with the rest of the oil and the brown rice in a medium frying pan, this time with 225ml (8fl oz) of boiling water, for 40 to 45 minutes, until the water has gone and the rice is tender.
- Dressing: Meanwhile, pound the garlic and salt to a creamy paste in a pestle and mortar, then work in the mustard powder. Switch to a small whisk, add the vinegar and olive oil, and season with plenty of pepper.
- Walnuts and tomatoes: Toast the walnuts on a baking tray in the oven for 8 minutes, with a timer on. Cover the tomatoes with boiling water for exactly a minute, slip off the skins, halve them, squeeze out the seeds and chop the flesh small.
- Dress: Mix both rices in a serving bowl with 2 to 3 tablespoons of the dressing and leave to cool, about 1 hour.
- Mix: Stir in the cucumber, tomatoes, pepper, apple, cranberries and two-thirds each of the spring onions and walnuts, then the rest of the dressing. Scatter the remaining spring onions and walnuts over the top, or serve them on the side.
Notes
- Some packs of wild rice are mixed with long-grain rice, so check you're buying wild rice on its own.
- Every ingredient is plant-based, so the salad suits vegans as it stands.
- Food Standards Agency advice for cooked rice applies here: cool it within about an hour, then chill the salad and finish it within a day.
FAQs
Can I cook the brown and wild rice in one pan?
Not if you want both cooked properly. Delia tried it when she first wrote the recipe and could never make the timing work, as wild rice needs about 50 minutes and brown basmati 40 to 45.
Two small pans side by side is all it takes, and both can start at the same time. The brown rice simply finishes a little earlier and waits, covered, for the wild rice.
Why have some of the wild rice grains split open?
That’s normal. In her first How to Cook book Delia explains that wild rice tends to burst and split slightly as it cooks, which is no sign of a mistake.
Just don’t let it go much past the 50 minutes, since she warns against overcooking it, as with any rice. Tip the pan slightly at the end, and once no water runs out it’s done.
How far ahead can I make it for a party?
Start it the day before, the way her cold buffet timetable does. Make the rice with the dressing and cranberries only, cool it, cover it and chill it, and keep the chopped cucumber, tomatoes and pepper in the fridge with the spring onions in a small bag.
On the morning of the party, add the vegetables and two-thirds of the onions and nuts, then cover and chill again. Keep the toasted walnuts in a lidded box in a cool place, so the last of them still crunch on top.
How do I make it for 12?
Use her original 2001 amounts rather than doubling these. That means 225ml (8fl oz) brown basmati cooked in 450ml (16fl oz) water, and 120ml (4fl oz) wild rice cooked in 225ml (8fl oz) water, plus 50g (2oz) each of cranberries and walnuts, 3 tomatoes, a 7.5cm (3in) piece of cucumber, a whole small pepper, 1 apple and 3 spring onions.
The dressing for 12 is 1 clove of garlic, 1 teaspoon each of sea salt and mustard powder, 3 tablespoons of Champagne vinegar and 6 tablespoons of olive oil. Toss the warm rice in 3 to 4 tablespoons of it first, then add the rest with the vegetables.
Is this her old rice salad with wild rice added?
Close, as both are cold rice salads full of apple, walnuts and crisp vegetables. Her original rice salad recipe in the Complete Cookery Course uses brown basmati alone, with currants and a wine vinegar vinaigrette.
This one swaps the currants for dried cranberries and toasts the walnuts first. Its dressing is sharper too, with 1½ tablespoons of vinegar to 3 of oil, where her classic vinaigrette uses 1 to 6, so it cuts through the sweet cranberries.
