Today I'm showing you some food pics from
a fabulous birthday party we went to in Normandy not long ago. The food was
just delightful.
How about these skewered shrimps on
pineapple wedges – so pretty.
And this ham had all been sliced up and
then put back together to look like a whole ham – clever.
The langoustine tower looked spectacular
too.
In addition to the catered food, some
neighbours brought a a home-made rice
pudding which was universally acclaimed.
Unfortunately I didn't taste it but heard all about it the next
day. One of the guests had asked for the
recipe and this is it.
Recipe for rice pudding
1.5l full fat milk
80g 'normal' rice
100g sugar
sachet of vanilla sugar
Bring the milk and sugar to the boil, put
in rice and cook on simmer for an hour and a half or for 4 hours in 160 C oven
We had some debate about what normal rice
meant in this context – I think it means short grain rice.
I decided to make it for myself – I also found some
other recipes so I decided to do two for comparison purposes. Jama
from Jama's Alphabet Soup used a
different recipe for Rice
Pudding. Hers had a few
more ingredients including nutmeg which appealed to me.
 |
| French rice pudding after burnt top removed |
This experiment cannot be said to have been a
resounding success. The French version
was inedible – clearly I got the proportions wrong.
 |
| American Rice Pudding |
Jama's version had a good flavour but was also a bit
dry. I wonder whether that was the
rice? I looked for short grain rice but could
only get medium. So the best one was the
American recipe.
The langoustine tower beats the ass off an Iceland prawn ring (you probably have to be a Brit to get that).
ReplyDeleteYes, it makes a massive difference what rice you make rice pudding with. It should be short grain but I suspect for that cooking time you'd also need to cover it. If you can't find it where you are, Amazon can be a great place for unusual ingredients.
Fascinating Pictures : )
ReplyDeleteI couldn't tell who told you "normal rice."
Here in the U.S., Long Grain is a 10 to 1 (or perhaps 100 to 1) favorite. Short Grain is hard to find, and sometimes can only be found in an ethnic specialty shop (I prefer short grain myself). If an American told me "normal rice" I would take that to mean long grain white.
Vanilla Sugar is *very* difficult to find here - Americans nearly all use liquid Vanilla Extract or Liquid Imitation Vanilla Extract.
Thanks, Anna. It was a French person who described the rice as normal. Cheers
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