Nice & Easy Tomato Rice

It's fasting month, and one of a 'must-have' menu for my family is Tomato Rice :) No, we don't eat this every day, but my kids love this, they would eat a few helping. It's even nice on it's own. You could easily get the instant mixed packet, or could even do it yourslef, it's not that troublesome, really! The usually dishes that accompany it is Ayam Masak Merah (a mild chilli gravy chicken dish), or Kurma Daging (a brownish type of curry), or Ayam Madu (a sweeter version of Ayam Masak Merah which you add honey in the end), or Dhalca (a type of dhal curry with mixed vegitables, also could add either chicken, beef or lamb), and some veggies (sometimes added with pineapple) called Acar which is sweet and sour.

Here's my version of Tomato Rice:

3 cups of rice (preferably long grain)
3 diced fresh tomatoes
3 tbsp of tomato sauce/ketchup
1 can of tomato soup
1/2 can of evaporated milk
2 tbsp of ghee (could be replaced with butter)
3 cups of water
2 pandan leaves (if big size, just use one)
1 cinnamon stick
2 star anise
3 cardamom
3 clove
2 garlic and 1/4 onion blended
1 tsp salt

In the rice-cooker pot, melt ghee/butter, add in the mixture of blended garlic and onion, and all the herbs. Then, add in all the tomatoes (diced, soup and sauce/ketchup), mix them well before you pour in the milk. Mix again. Once nicely done, add in pandan leaves, salt and rice, and again you have to mix them well before adding in water. You can transfer the pot into the rice cooker and let it cook. Please remember to keep watching over it and fold the rice times to times so that it will mix evenly. Scatter some fried onions on the rice before serving.

Notes:
You could also replace 1 cup out of the 3 cups of water with chicken or beef stock, or else just use the instant cubes :) The original recipe include 1/3 cup of peas and and 1/3 cup of raisins, but my kids do not like them so they were excluded. You could add them in before transferring the pot to the rice cooker.