Forbidden Breakfast Rice Pudding

Found this recipe yesterday on the My New Roots.org blog, I knew I had a package of Boxed Goodes Forbidden Black Grains at home and so I had to try it out immediately. I redeemed all the soda cans I was saving from the cafe at work so I could buy the coconut milk on my way home yesterday. Redeeming cans is usually a sticky experience at best, and often not worth the gas it takes you to drive there, but during a snow storm after you get sent home from work early, it's really not that bad! I made this last night, so I only soaked my rice for about 1 hour, and I think I overcooked it a little--so be sure you keep an eye on it. The original recipe states serves 3-4, but with the coffee and all the pineapple I was way too overfull after breakfast this morning. I'll divide into 5 portions next time.

Forbidden Breakfast Rice Pudding


Ingredients:

1 cup / 200g black rice, soaked overnight (if possible)

1 can full-fat coconut milk (reserve a couple tablespoons for garnish, if desired)

½ cup water with soaked rice, 1 ½ cups water with un-soaked rice

¼ tsp. fine grain sea salt

½ vanilla bean (optional)

1 Tbsp. maple syrup (I used about 1/4 cup)

1/3 cup coconut flakes, lightly toasted


Tropical fruits for topping! (I used warmed pineapple)



Directions: Bring the rice, water, coconut milk, salt and vanilla bean to a boil, stir once and reduce heat and simmer until rice is tender. Cooking time could be anywhere from 20-40 minutes, and pre-soaked rice takes significantly less time! Remove from heat, fish out vanilla bean* and stir in the maple syrup. Top with toasted coconut and your favorite tropical fruits.



*Note: I rinsed the vanilla bean gently and dried it out on the stoneware cookie sheet as I slowly toasted coconut at 300F. You can still get more use out of it! I scraped some of the tiny beans into my hot chocolate mix for the afternoon.



And P.S. canned mango sucks. Oh, impulsive me, I went out on a limb and now John and I have to eat it all so it doesn't go to waste.