Making my way around the world, one rice pudding at a time... Riz au lait de coco et bananes caramélisées

 

 

Or coconut rice pudding with caramelised bananas if you will. You may or may not remember (or, in fact, care) that I bought a French recipe magazine in Calais on my way back from my hols as a way of keeping my French language knowledge ticking over until I return again. Well, this is another recipe from it that I have tweaked a little

 

All the family adore rice pudding, and whilst I am certainly not averse to opening a tin (or two) of the stuff to make everyone happy, it is nice, and no less importantly for me, easy to make your own. I like the idea of making it a bit tropical with the addition somewhere of some coconut, and I liked the way that this recipe suggests at tropical fruit as a 'compote' to replace where we might put a dollop of jam. The original recipe suggests caramelising mango slices but I settled on bananas because that is what I had to hand. And coconut and bananas is really quite nice.

 

The addition of the yolks I think makes this a bit more custard-y. Unfortunately my yolks weren't that golden sunset colour that you can get and I think if they were it would have turned the rice pudding a pleasingly happy primrose colour. Next time I will 'go for golden', so to speak. 

 

Riz au Lait de Coco et Bananes Caramélisées, or Coconut Rice Pudding with Caramelised Bananas, adapted and translated from 'La cuisine a Grand Mere' magazine.

 

Serves 4 - 6

 

Ingredients:

 

150g pudding rice

a vanilla pod, split in two (though I used a teaspoon of vanilla extract)

25g shredded coconut

80g caster sugar (or to taste, I would suggest - this  is not a sweet rice pudding, though the banana topping is)

Two egg yolks

800ml semi skimmed milk

 

For the topping

2 ripe bananas, sliced

15g unsalted butter

30g light brown sugar

Method:

 

Split the vanilla pod in half (if you are using a vanilla pod, that is)

 

 

 

Rinse the rice under cold water. Boil the milk with the grated coconut, vanilla (extract), add the rice and cook over low heat for 20 to 30 minutes, stirring occasionally.

 

Stir in the sugar and egg yolks in the end.

 

 

 

In a frying pan, melt the butter and add the sugar and stir to combine. Add the bananas and coat in the butter and sugar mixture. Leave to cook a minute or so on each side, but allow the slices to retain their shape.

 

 

Serve the rice pudding in bowls with the banana slices on top.

Spanish and Moreish: Arroz con Leche, or Rice Pudding with Orange and Lemon

After a balmy March, April can only be described as a bit of a wash out, and a cold one at that. Yesterday in particular was bitter (or 'Baltic' as some of us say around these parts) and walking to pick up Lola was a bone chilling, damp experience, reminiscent of those days of Autumn when the skies are leaden, the wind cuts right through you, hinting at Winter, and where no one should really leave home without an umbrella. Ugh, horrible... and alien to my sun loving soul.

So whilst I was dodging the puddles (Finn wasn't; there is nothing more entertaining than jumping in them, let's face it) my thoughts turned to the night's meal. I'd already gone down a Spanish route, with a chorizo and pork casserole (blog post to follow) so I decided that Spain was where it was at, and that a pudding that you could curl up infront of the telly with was in order. Rice Pudding - Arroz con Leche if you will.

I used to know someone who used to open a tin of Ambrosia rice pudding, warm it up, put it in an oven proof dish, sprinkle sugar on the top and put it under the grill to create something like a caramelised, 'skin' top, then passing it off as her own, because she thought it was easier than making her own. It isn't. It sounds like a faff. Making your own rice pudding is really rather easy and whilst you can complicate it like I have done here, the principle is really rather easy, as long as you are able to keep an eye on it and not let it catch too much on the bottom of the pan (though that comes under cook's perks for me; the slightly caramelised scrapings from the bottom of the pan are sweet, vanilla and have the consistency of a chewy sweet - delish!)

This recipe is adapted from Modern Spanish Cooking by Sam and Eddie Hart; a superb Spanish cookery book of which I want to cook every recipe and eat it all. Their suggestion of making a quick orange jam to go along with the citrussy rice pudding was inspired, though I had no brandy as the original recipe calls for, so I dug out my trusty bottle or Triple Sec and used that instead. It's by no means necessary to make it, as the rice pudding is stunningly gorgeous as it is, but if you are looking for something just a little bit different, you may have just found it here.

Arroz con Leche, adapted from Modern Spanish Cooking by Sam and Eddie Hart

Serves Lola, Finn, Mum and Dad

For the rice pudding:

850ml whole milk

finely pared strip of zest of 1 orange

finely paired strip of zest of 1 lemon

1/2 tsp cinnamon

150g pudding rice (they suggest Arborio but pudding rice was fine - and cheaper!)

120g sugar

1 vanilla pod (though a tsp of good vanilla extract will suffice)

For the orange jam:

150ml orange juice (about 2 large oranges)

1/2 tsp cinnamon

zest of an orange

1 tbsp sugar

30ml triple sec

Method:

Take a large saucepan and put all the rice pudding ingredients in it. Give it a quick stir then turn the heat on. Bring it slowly to the boil then reduce the heat so that the mixture simmers. It will take around 40 minutes or so. You're looking for the rice to have swelled and be cooked through and for the liquid to be of a creamy consistency. Keep an eye on it whilst it is cooking.

Meanwhile, to make the orange jam, in a small saucepan put all of the ingredients, give it a quick stir and slowly bring to the boil, stirring to dissolve the sugar. Simmer until the mixture has reduced to a slightly runny syrup. This could take about 15 minutes on a gentle heat, maybe more.

To serve: Remove the citrus zest and vanilla pod from the rice pudding (if you can find them). Serve in warm bowls with some of the orange jam.

A perfect pudding for an unseasonably cold day.

Inspired by the past - Coconut rice pudding with pineapple sauce

One of the (many) things that puts a smile on my face is thinking about things to do with the past. I don't live in the past, despite my love of family history, but I do think about times gone and allow my memory to indulge itself in a remembrance of times gone. It might be a piece of music, a smell, a taste that takes me back to a place that is a little fuzzy around the edges.

So, it was opening a tin of coconut milk back in present time to make Nigella's speedy Thai curry (no doubt appearing at a blog near you soon, now I have reminded myself of it) and the waft of coconut took me firstly to holidays and bottles of Hawaiian Tropic and lazy days amongst the sea and sand and lovely warm sun. Then I was reminded of the bottle of Malibu that a school friend and I used to have stashed in her bedroom which became notably our tipple of choice as we ventured out clubbing for the first time at far too young an age. (Notice how the goalposts have changed; when I was 15 it was fine, when Lola is 15 and behaving in the same way I will be wringing my hands). That bottle of Malibu became the theme of those evenings, and because we knew no better, Malibu and pineapple became our drink of choice and when we had exhausted our funds, we would flutter our eyelashes at any blokes in the hope they would keep our glasses full until about 10 minutes before the end of the night we would disappear, before things got complicated.

Even though |I got old, Malibu and pineapple didn't, (neither did its similarly schoolgirly tipple of that time, Cinzano and lemonade) and I have in the not too distant past bought a bottle of Malibu in a fit of nostalgic reverie and poured myself a suitably large one and laced it with a dash of pineapple, and it is from this combination of flavours that this pudding 'evolved'. I'd thought about coconut ice cream with pineapple jelly forgetting that pineapple and jelly is really not a good idea if you would like the jelly to set, though I think there may be a time where I consider a cool double hit of coconut ice cream and pineapple ice cream, which may turn out to be the summer version to this essentially winter pudding. The thing I love about this though is the creamy coconut rice with the sweetly acidic edge of pineapple works for me, totally, and whilst it might not transport me totally back to Falcon's Crest circa 1989/1990 it makes me smile nevertheless. I hope it makes you smile too.

Coconut rice pudding with pineapple sauce

Ingredients:

Serves 4, plus Lola and Finn

8oz pudding rice

A tin of coconut milk

Milk, measured out in the empty coconut milk tin plus about 200ml extra 

About 2oz sugar (add more to taste if you have a sweet tooth)

a dash of vanilla extract or a vanilla pod

Half a pineapple, or a tin of pineapple (chunks or rings, your call) but I think fresh pineapple is sweeter.

2 tbsp cornflour

2 tbsp icing sugar (or to taste)

To make the rice pudding, add all the ingredients to as suitable pan (I use my cast iron pot) mix well, then taste. You may want more sugar, but go easy.

Cover, place on the stove for about an hour, checking carefully to make sure it doesn't dry out. If it's looking a little dry, slacken it off with either some cream or milk.

Meantime, make the pineapple sauce. Blitz the pineapple with a handheld blender or a mini processor. Add the cornflour to thicken the mixture and then add icing sugar to taste. Place into a pan and begin to warm through gently until the cornflour thickens the mixture and the icing sugar dissolves into the pineapple. Set aside.

When the rice pudding is ready, ladle some into bowls, then dollop the pineapple sauce in the middle.