a few months ago i had a major craving for indian rice pudding (remember in my last post i was working on it). i went to a few indian shops to satisfy my sweet tooth but nothing lived up to my memory of the indian rice pudding i had growing up. i know that sounds strange because as some of you know, i am not indian. every summer for as long as i could remember, i would go up north to san jose and stay with my cousins. as soon as i got there they would ask me where i wanted to go and what i wanted to do that summer. my top pick every summer was this little indian restaurant where they had the best rice pudding. it was sort of soupy, not thick like the american version, and scented with jaggery and cardamom and made with fragrant basmati rice. i absolutely HAD to have the rice pudding i remembered and so i decided to try to make it myself. (i was also on a major middle eastern and indian food kick during that time.) i consulted my good friend and trusted resource to all things indian aarti(check out her blog!)
her recipe had some ingredients that i didn't have available or didn't like too much (like rose water) so i added, subtracted and tweaked it to fit my memory of the rice pudding i had in my childhood years in san jose. the one thing that was a completely new addition was topping it with a dessert masala (this idea came from her recipe). p.s. i love the word masala! it means a paste or dry mixture of spices and other ingredients like ginger. the dessert masala for the rice pudding has pistachios, cashews, tangelo zest, cardamom and other fun surprises in it. a little bit really goes a long way with this stuff, but it adds so much depth of flavor. so, please try it out and let me know what you think.
one last thing....
check out my friend aarti sequeira on "the next food network star" on the food network! you can also show her some love by watching her online cooking show "quick bites" on youtube.
you can also check out my cousin's blog "my foggy brain" as she chronicles her daily highs and lows living with fibromyalgia.
