Rice pudding is one of those recipes invented to brighten up life. Not only is it delicious and easy to prepare, but it is also very versatile and adapts to all tastes: denser, lighter, spicy… If you are a novice cook, preparing the basic rice pudding recipe is so simple that you will get rich at first. If you have already mastered it, there are a thousand variations that you can try to please yourself. Anyway, if you like rice pudding, you want to continue reading.
How to make rice pudding
Ingredients
The recipe for rice pudding is one of the recipes that is passed down from generation to generation. Each family has its own, but if you want to make an easy rice pudding recipe, you should start with the following ingredients: Arroz Cigala round rice, milk, sugar, cinnamon, and lemon zest.
Advice
Some add butter or cream to make it creamier, some advise boiling the rice in water before adding it to the milk, some add other spices… Each cook has his touch, but all share a few keys to making the richest rice pudding in the world:
1. The rice must be round
Round rice has the property of releasing starch better, which is essential to ensure that your dessert is creamy. Creamy does not mean mushy: choose a variety that does not melt, like Arooz Cigala, and this way you will always be on point.
2. Let cool
Okay, it takes a long time to not burn your tongue, but rice needs time to rest to reach its ideal consistency. Just remember to start cooking early enough so that your rice pudding is completely cold by dessert time.
3. Mime the details
Often, the success of recipes is in the details. Use only the yellow part of the lemon zest, as the white part can impart bitter notes. Make a shortcut with the cinnamon sticks and lemon to easily remove them before serving. Always add the sugar at the end of cooking so that it stays on point and does not harden.
4. Experiment with different recipes
No rice pudding lover can resist trying it in all its consistencies and presentations. Rice pudding cake, rice pudding pudding, rice pudding milkshake, rice pudding ice cream … No shape or texture can resist it.
Your rice pudding recipe
You like rice pudding, you have the basic recipe, and -why not innovate? Don’t worry, there are many ideas to innovate with this dessert and eat it in a thousand ways. Let yourself be guided by these tips and you will end up loving it:
Do it with spices. Rice, especially if it is the round rice Arroz Cigala, absorbs flavors very well. This invites you to innovate and vary your recipes by giving them new aromas. Cardamom, cloves, anise, vanilla… Start your particular search to find your perfect combination.
Add a crunchy point. The creamy and crunchy contrast of desserts always triumphs. You can add nuts or a layer of burnt sugar to give that Crisp touch. You can also make a rice pudding in two textures by topping your dessert with a little puffed rice, flavored with your favorite spices.
Make it accessible to everyone. The traditional recipe is the best but lactose-free rice pudding or skimmed rice pudding are also delicious. There is no excuse for people with intolerances, allergies, or limitations in fat consumption not to try it: it only replaces whole milk with semi-skimmed, lactose-free milk or vegetable milk. Everyone will enjoy it!
Shape your creativity. Cooked rice is soft and very fluffy. Don’t cut yourself and use it to design recipes for balls or chocolates filled with sweet rice. A homogeneous rice pudding can be an excellent base for your creations.
Rice Desserts Rice Pudding and Beyond
Rice is very versatile in baking, as it can take on very different textures, from the most fun crunchy to the softest creamy. Thanks to its starch content, it also helps us to give consistency to puddings and cakes, with many possibilities for traditional or innovative desserts. There are examples for all tastes:
Rice pudding in all its variations: We talked about our rice pudding of a lifetime. This recipe has its own equally delicious version in other parts of the world, closer to the Portuguese rice twelve, which incorporates yolks into the Spanish recipe. There are also others more exotic, like the Indian Kheer, in which its unique creamy texture is flavored with nuts and spices that make us hear the music, but with different lyrics.
Creams and flans. This creamy texture that rice brings to preparations is a very rich base for thousands of dessert ideas. It is always succulent, whether by curiously twisting traditional recipes like Catalan cream or innovative ideas for the most restless chefs, like this chocolate rice cake.
Cakes, pies, and puddings: Another advantage of rice in baking is that it gives consistency to the preparations. A very special texture that can be enjoyed, in a rice pudding or whatever!
Pastries. Sweets made from rice dough, little known in Morocco but very popular in Asian gastronomy, are consumed in different shapes and colors in countries such as Japan, where they are called Mochi, as well as China, Korea, and countries in Southeast Asia.
Crispy. If you fry or roast it after cooking, the rice swells and becomes light and crispy. This fun texture raises several levels of pleasure in any creamy preparation (ice cream, yogurt, custard), and goes wonderfully with chocolate. It is not for nothing that puffed rice is the soul of the chocolate nougat that delighted us so much on Ashura. It also serves as a base for making a delicious homemade snack in the form of pancakes or bars, which you can garnish with honey, sesame, and nuts, or with whatever you like best.
Advice
If a rice milkshake seems like a very revolutionary idea to you, it is because you do not know the chicha criolla, a traditional Venezuelan recipe that recalls rice pudding. It is usually enjoyed fresh in the snack, like our horchata. Another way to consume liquid rice is rice milk, whose consumption is growing in the full boom of vegetables whether in the vegan diet or by intolerances or allergies.
Dried rice. Sweet dried rice? Yes. In the gastronomy of countries where rice is part of the daily diet, such as Pakistan, there are desserts such as Zarda, a yellow rice with dried fruits and spices that is eaten during the holidays. In Thailand, they take it as a dessert boiled and seasoned with coconut milk, accompanied by fruits.
You see that it is very easy to enjoy varied and rich rice desserts often. Wait, often? Keep in mind that rice only provides carbohydrates and minerals, it has almost no fat, so rice desserts do not need to be a calorie bomb. Just choose the recipes well and leave the heaviest ones to pay tribute to yourself from time to time.
