French · Dessert
Riz au Lait
Rice pudding cooked loose and glossy, ribboned with salted butter caramel — bistro nursery food elevated by patience and good vanilla
- Prep
- 10 min
- Cook
- 45 min
- Serves
- 6
Ingredients
- Short-grain pudding rice — 180 g
- Whole milk — 1.2 L
- Double cream — 100 ml
- Caster sugar — 70 g
- Vanilla pod — 1
- Fine salt — 2 g
- Caramel: caster sugar 120 g, double cream 100 ml, salted butter 40 g, fleur de sel 2 g
Method
- Blanch rice 2 min in boiling water; drain (removes surface starch for a cleaner finish).
- Bring milk with split vanilla to a simmer; add rice and salt.
- Cook at the barest simmer, stirring every few minutes, 30–35 min, until the rice is tender and suspended in a loose cream — it thickens as it cools, so stop early.
- Stir in sugar and the 100 ml cream; cook 3 min more. Remove the pod.
- Caramel: cook sugar dry to deep amber; whisk in warmed cream (carefully), then butter and fleur de sel; simmer 1 min.
- Serve the rice warm or chilled, caramel rippled through at the last moment.