Dairy-free coconut black rice pudding with almonds and raspberries

My inspiration for this recipe is an Indonesian black rice pudding, which was specially requested by a friend a few weeks ago. She’s always had a sweet tooth, so it was not a surprise that she fell madly in love with the rich sweet rice pudding while her recent stay in Bali. Since I am also a fan of the dish myself I decided to give it a go, but with a little bit of twist.

I know the traditional (or conventional) version of rice pudding is already incredible, but this seems to be too good an opportunity to miss out on adding some my favorite spices and nutty flavors. I am also adding tangy raspberries, which I personally like to pair with rich flavored dessert, but tropical fruits such as mango, pineapple or banana will also work well with the pudding. This dessert is dairy-free and if you want a vegan version you can use agave nectar instead of honey.

• Prep time: 8hrs for soaking rice
• Cooking time: 35-40mins
• Serves: 4

Ingredients

• 1 cup. black glutinous rice
• 1 cinnamon stick
• 1/2 tsp. sea salt
• 1 1/2 cup. water
• 1 1/2 cup. unsweetened coconut milk for cooking
• 5-6 tsp. unsweetened coconut milk for garnish
• 1 vanilla bean or 1 1/2 tsp. vanilla extract
• 1 cup. unsweetened almond milk
• 2 whole cloves
• 3 tbsp. pure honey (agave nectar for vegan version)
• handful of almond flakes
• handful of raspberries or fruit of your choice

Soak black rice overnight for about 8 hours. Rinse and place it in a pot with a cinnamon stick, sea salt, 1 1/2 cup of water and coconut milk (3 cups of liquid in total).

With a sharp pairing knife, halve the vanilla pod lengthwise and scrape the seeds out. Add the seeds into the pot, set aside the pod for later. If you don’t have a vanilla pod, you can use 1 teaspoon of vanilla extract instead.

Bring the rice to a boil and turn the heat down to low for a gentle simmer. Cover and cook for 30-35 minutes stirring occasionally to make sure the rice won’t stick. Most of the liquid should be absorbed at the end.

When the rice has been cooking for 20 minutes, bring 1 cup of almond milk to a boil with a vanilla pod (or 1/2 teaspoon of vanilla extract), cloves and honey in a separate pot. Turn off the heat after boiling for a minute, and let the spices infuse until the rice is cooked.

Remove cloves and vanilla pod, mix warm almond milk with cooked rice. Simmer over a medium heat for 3-4 minutes stirring gently.

Serve the rice pudding with final garnish of coconut milk, almond flakes and raspberries.