Arroz Tapado

I found this dish in one of my regular food blogs. The idea looked really awesome and Brit seemed pretty interested. Thankfully for my amazing girlfriend, I came home late from work, but she had done almost all of the prep work for dinner. She graciously let me take over at that point to do the actual cooking so she could take a break and just enjoy the rest of the evening. Overall the dish was good and tasty, but not very impressive and didn't have much of a Wow! factor. We both felt that using ground beef, instead of ground turkey, would have added some extra moisture and flavor to the fish, but that there was still something lacking and we're not sure exactly how to improve it.

Arroz Tapado
(adapted from a Food In My Beard recipe)

Serves a lot

2 cups basmati rice, cooked and seasoned well with salt and pepper
1 lb. ground turkey
2 medium sweet potatoes, diced
28 oz. diced tomatoes
1 tbsp smoked paprika
2 tsp cumin
1 onion, chopped
1 bell pepper, chopped
3 cloves garlic, chopped
3 hard boiled eggs, roughly chopped
1/4 cup parsley, chopped
1/4 cup black olives, roughly chopped

Roast the sweet potatoes at 450 F in some olive oil and salt until browned and tender. Remove and set aside.
Brown the turkey in a skillet in some olive oil and then set aside. Cook the onion and pepper until soft and then add in the garlic, paprika, and cumin for a few more minutes. (Chef's note: It would probably be better to cook the veggies first and then add the meat directly to the skillet. The flavor of the veggies and meat can blend together while keeping the meat from drying out while sitting aside.)
Return the meat to the skillet along with the tomatoes, eggs, parsley, and olives. Simmer for about 15 minutes and then stir in the sweet potatoes.
To assemble this dish, take a medium-large sized bowl and spray it with non-stick spray. Fill the bottom 1/3 with rice, fill the middle 1/3 with the meat mixture, and then cover the top 1/3 with more rice. Ensure that each layer is firmly in place and invert the bowl onto a plate. Gently tap and lift up the bowl revealing a very nice looking mound of food.