Swedish Rice Porridge

What makes rice porridge different from rice pudding? It's not as sweet and isn't made with traditional custard ingredients, such as milk or cream and eggs, as some recipes do. The recipe I use comes from an old American Girl cookbook. I used to make it twice a month, but stopped a few years ago. I thought about it again during the end of my run on Sunday because I was hungry, tired, and wanted something filling to eat. The only downside is that it takes an hour or longer to prepare, but I had no problem nibbling while I waited.

To begin, jasmine rice gets cooked with butter, a cinnamon stick, and water. As that mixture simmered, I prepped the remaining ingredients. I measured out 4 cups of milk, chopped an apple, and measured the brown sugar and dried cranberries.

I've really been loving the pinch bowls I got from Wayfair.com. They're nice for snacks because there are measurement markers, so you can easily figure out how much you're portioning out. For backing and cooking, I can dump ingredients right in according to the lines.

Once the rice is ready, milk is added and heated just until it begins to simmer. The rest of the ingredients are stirred in and the porridge is cooked for 30-45 minutes, until the consistency is of a thick pudding. You can cook it a bit less if you want a somewhat runnier consistency.

I always have trouble with this step. Milk isn't supposed to boil because it will curdle. The recipe tells you to reduce heat to low and cover with a lid, stirring occasionally. Even after doing this, the liquid still sometimes boils! I guess I should leave the lid off next time. However, it didn't get too curdled, though it took just 25-30 minutes instead of 45. I can deal.

This rice porridge is comforting, delicious, and lightly sweetened. You could drizzle the top with honey or stir in more brown sugar, if you'd prefer. It might not be the most nutritional start to the day, though if you used brown rice it would be better for you.

Recipe after the jump.

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Swedish Rice Porridge
From American Girls Cookbook

If you would rather use brown rice, try preparing it the day before, proceeding to step 2.

ingredients -

1 tablespoon unsalted butter
1 cup white rice
1 cup water
1/4 teaspoon coarse salt
1 cinnamon stick
4 cups milk
1 large, firm apple, chopped
1/2 cup dried fruit, like raisins, cranberries, blueberries, or cherries
3 tablespoons brown sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla or lemon extract
Addition milk and sweeteners, if desired

directions -

1. Rub the finger onto the bottom of a 3-quart saucepan. Put the rice, water, cinnamon stick and salt in the saucepan and bring to a boil over medium heat. Lower the heat to a simmer. Cover the pot and simmer for 10-15 minutes, or until all the water has been absorbed.


2. Pour the milk into the saucepan. Over medium heat, bring to a simmer. When the milk begins to simmer, turn heat down to low. Carefully add the apple, dried fruit, and brown sugar. Stir gently.


3. Cover the pan and simmer the porridge for 30-45 minutes. As it cooks, it will thicken. Stir occasionally.


4. When the porridge is the proper consistency, take the pot off the heat. Remove the cinnamon stick and stir in the extract. Serve with additional milk and honey.

Persian Roasted Chicken with Jeweled Saffron Rice

So I had used the macadamia nuts Oh! Nuts had sent me, but not the dried red sour cherries. I vaguely remembered some rice dish studded with dried fruit, and when I looked it up I found many recipes for Persian jeweled rice, a rich rice dish with dried fruits, nuts, and a crapton of butter. Clear winner.

The recipe I settled on included instructions for roasted chicken with a simple marinade consisting of cumin, olive oil, onions, and saffron. I don't think I used 1/4 cup olive oil since I used less chicken, and I halved the amount of cumin, otherwise everything was the same. I also didn't toss out the onions when the time came to roast the chicken since it would add more flavor to the broth.

The rice. I love the stuff and would eat it everyday if I made it that often. However, I rarely venture outside of the typical manner of preparation. Sure, I've made sushi rice and mango coconut sticky rice, also risotto and rice puddings, though pertaining to side dish rices I stuck with the norm. One interesting aspect in the preparation for jeweled rice is that you parboil the rice first, as it will continue to cook on the stove or in the oven after being layered.

Let me talk about boiled rice. Typically, you would steam rice, using just enough water to be fully absorbed by the rice by the end of the cooking time. With this method, prepared as you would pasta, the rice is boiled in salted water until tender (or in this case, less than al dente). The salt seasons the rice, and the rice comes out tender, separate, and perfectly cooked. The first recipe I used says to parboil the rice for 5 minutes, and it can be left to sit until you're ready to use it, drained and covered. (During which, it practically finished cooking itself by the residual heat.)

Did I mention that it took a mere 5 minute to reach an almost cooked state? That would mean a few minutes to 5 minutes longer would have resulted in completely cooked rice, which is half the time it takes when steamed. I remember reading about this in a thread on Chow.com, I think, and some people swore by this method. And to think I never would have tried it had it not been for this recipe.

So, the link up there says to cook it for 10 minutes, and if you're not going to let it sit for a 1-3 hours, you probably should. Otherwise, 5 minutes would do. I'll post the second link below.

Also of note, I used jasmine rice since I didn't have basmati and it came out fine.

When ready to assemble, crushed saffron gets mixed with water, then tossed with the rice. The saffron I used came from a Mexican store, and it wasn't very expensive. Maybe it's a sub-quality saffron or a different type that produces more from each crop, I don't know. It didn't really color the rice much, so possibly old saffron loses its dying ability or I just needed more of it.

Next step is to melt the butter with the dried cherries and sugar. I used 1/2 cup dried cherries and a 1/4 cup packed dark raisins.

This used a lot of butter -- 1 stick plus 2 tablespoons. I was tempted to reduce the amount to half a stick or 6 tablespoons, but the idea of the excess richness intrigued me enough to give it a go and see if it was worth it.

Separately, I toasted 1/3 cup pepita seeds for 3 minutes in a 350 degree oven (if you hear popping, stop).

The rice gets layered in a 2-quart baking dish with two layers of the butter-plumped dried fruit and toasted pepitas. Once you finish with the last layer of rice, the butter gets poured on top.

How this recipe differs from the one I was going to try is that this is baked, whereas the other recipe tells you to cook the rice during the second stage over the stove, which helps the rice develop a golden crust on the bottom that gets broken up afterwards. I would follow this recipe for ingredients and the other recipe for the cooking method next time, as it would taste exceptionally good with the crispy crust pieces.

The chicken came out incredibly moist and very tender. I skipped the broiling step, as the chicken actually cooked 5-10 minutes longer than the recipe said (I didn't start the layering of the rice soon enough) and the skins were already crispy and golden.

THE RICE was incredible! Just on the verge of sweet, and very buttery and rich. The sweetness and flavor of the cherries with the taste and crunch of the pepitas made the dish unique. Although it was a little sweet, it was a great pairing with the chicken. I also ate some leftover rice for breakfast this morning with milk and fresh strawberries.

But I cannot express enough how incredible this rice was. Not very difficult to prepare, even with the many steps, and since the rice can be made ahead of time it helps to break the steps up so you don't have to do everything at once.

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Recipes

Persian Roasted Chicken with Dried Cherry-Saffron Rice ~ I followed this recipe exactly, though I prepared the rice according to step one from the recipe linked below.

Jeweled Rice with Dried Fruit ~ Here, I used the their method of preparing the rice ahead of time. Next time, I would follow these instructions for preparation and cooking method of the entire dish. I will note that the inclusion of the sugar is vital to the taste of this recipe, though you can leave it out if you'd rather.

Hello Kitty and homemade sushi

My friend, Gregie, who currently resides in Japan, sent me a gift a while back. Except he wouldn't tell me what it was exactly. So when it came I opened the box to find a Hello Kitty bowl and matching chopsticks!

He asked that upon receiving the gift, I'd feature it on my blog with sushi. Um. This all went down a few months ago. I'm sorry. I obviously was purposely procrastinating not because I thought sushi was out of my skill level, but because I don't really like the stuff. Maybe I'm not white enough (seriously, I'm part Hispanic), maybe I had issues with the texture. Whatever the reason, I remembered the last time I tried some and almost choked to death. No lie, true story.

Because of this, I have not used the bowl and cute little chopsticks at all up until now. I felt guilty. And so, finally, I decided to make the sushi so I could use the gift and quit being rude.

After finding a really simple guide to homemade sushi through a search on Photograzing, I was on my way.

I assembled the required ingredients of sticky rice (which I cooked in the microwave, one of the simplest ways to prepare it outside -- literally, of a rice cooker) which was seasoned (I should have stopped there), nori, the seaweed sheet, my fillings of choice which consisted of carrot ribbons, slivered green onions, and a fake crab filling (I wasn't afraid of using fish, but since I didn't think I'd like the sushi at all I wasn't going to go out of my way to find sushi grade fish, and I knew everyone would be fine with that) flavored with wasabi horseradish, ginger powder, and fresh garlic.

The wooden-not-sure-if-it's-actual-bamboo mat was lined with a sheet of plastic wrap, then topped with a sheet of nori. The rice was patted out, leaving about a 1-inch border at the top, using moistened fingers to keep the rice was sticking. I'm not sure how much rice I used per sheet, but I cooked 2 cups of rice and the entire batch made four rolls.

The only difficult part, and it's not all that difficult, is making sure the first roll is rolled over the filling, if that makes any sense. The bamboo mat and the plastic wrap is what you use to aid in making that first roll really compact, which will hold the filling in place as you slice and serve it. Really make it tight.
After this, I lifted the mat off and kind of peeled the plastic wrap off that got stuck in the center a bit, then I proceeded with the rolling of the sushi. Press tightly when you get to the end, and use the ends of the plastic wrap to hold the roll in place. Refrigerate it while you prepare the next roll.

I ended up with four rolls of sushi. You're supposed to slice these with a really sharp knife, which apparently I don't have, but I had excellent results using a serrated knife.

I was very, very happy with the results, and it looks so pretty, especially in my Hello Kitty bowl! But. Sushi just isn't for me. I'm not counting out sashimi, but sushi, I don't know, I cannot eat it. At least the traditional version. Maybe a dessert sushi, or a sushi with a thin egg omelette wrapper instead of nori.

In fact, this slice of sushi was the only slice I was able to eat. I definitely liked it better dipped in soy sauce, which kind of masked whatever I didn't like about it. Until I ate it.

So I had a lot of fun making it, at least! And now I can go around telling people I made sushi and listen to their praise, which will make up for not being able to eat it.

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General instructions for making sushi -- The rice seasoning liquid was incredible. I think I'd prepare the rice like this again, but serve it with a stir fry.

Microwave sticky rice recipe -- Don't have a steamer or rice cooker? No worries. You can easily make sticky rice in the microwave!

I suggest going to an Asian market/store to find the ingredients needed, like the nori sheets, rice wine vinegar, etc., because it will be cheaper than buying it from the ethnic section of the grocery store. Obviously, go to the grocery store if that's the only place available.

Thanks again, Gregie!

chicken satay

"No more spoons! Use your hands!" Says the charming schnitzel man!

Gosh, how I love that movie. And how I love chicken on a stick. In fact, many people like to eat with their hands, so you would probably enjoy satay, which is usually made by skewering raw chicken onto wooden skewers before cooking.

The marinade consists of yogurt, five spice powder, salt, raw garlic, cilantro, and possibly something else, but since I can't find the notebook I took notes in I'm not entirely certain.

Zucchini strips.

Orange peanut sauce.

Chicken skewered with a zucchini slice. The bummer part is that I should have blanched the strips because they kept breaking and falling apart as I was skewering them.

FIRE -- a necessary element. Half of the peanut sauce goes to baste the chicken strips.

Remember the zucchini strips? Many of them went as a sacrifice to the flames. And many of the skewers burnt to a crisp, although I soaked them for quite a while.

This is just beautiful stuff, right here.

Now, I don't like eating with my hands. They get all messy, I start up feeling claustrophobic, reaching for anything dry and soft to wipe my hands on, I just cannot unleash the inner kid that I keep locked away in the depths of my soul.

Balancing the chicken, here we have a simple cucumber-tomato salad with a miso vinaigrette. I believe I keep saying I will blog about the vinaigrette, and I will. Eventually.

Salad, chicken on a stick with orange peanut sauce and cilantro, and jasmine rice.