Mango Sweet Rice

I don’t do a lot of desserts on this site, mostly because my goal here is to deal with the gritty reality of learning to cook on this diet: to answer the question, “What the heck can I put on the table for this kid, right here and now?” Homebaked treats are great and all, but there are a ton of gluten-free baking resources out there, and frankly, I just don’t enjoy baking all that much. (Have you tried the new Betty Crocker gluten-free brownie mix, by the way? It’s awesome. The cookie mix, not so much in my opinion, but the brownies… oh wow.) Anyway, gluten-free box mixes aside, sometimes a dessert comes along that’s so easy to make, even I can put up with it.

You can get sweet rice (also sometimes called “sticky rice”) at Asian markets, but to be honest, I’ve never been able to taste the difference, myself. You could make this with any short-grain rice and it would work just fine.

Put one cup of it in your rice cooker, along with 1 and 3/4 cups of water. If you are using sweet rice, they say you should let it soak at room temperature for at least 20 minutes. I usually do, but only because I’m busy getting other stuff ready at the time.

This can of coconut milk was more separated than most. Yuck.

I had to actually dump the whole thing into a separate bowl to get it reincorporated without making a giant mess. But eventually it started looking like coconut milk again.

Now, pour 1/2 cup (or 1/4 of the can) of coconut milk into the rice pot, and set the remainder aside for a minute. Add 1 Tablespoon of brown sugar…

And 1/4 teaspoon of salt. Give everything a good stir, and begin cooking the rice.

Meanwhile, pour the rest of the coconut milk into a small saucepan on the stove.

Add 1/4 cup of sugar. I prefer brown sugar, but it does give the final sauce a slight beige color, so if you think your kids would prefer something frosty white, just use cane sugar instead. Useful tip: if your brown sugar has become hard as a rock in the container, microwave it for 10 seconds at a time, and it will loosen right up.

Also add 1 teaspoon of vanilla. Liquid vanilla extract is one of those things that might have gluten in it, because it’s distilled with alcohol and the manufacturer might use a grain alcohol. So you can hunt down a safe brand, or use this powdered vanilla that says gluten-free right on the bottle. Either way, it’s still one teaspoon.

While the sauce is warming, prepare your mango. I’m using a bag of frozen mango pieces, but you could certainly cut up a fresh mango or two if you want. But did you know that at certain times of the year, frozen fruits and vegetables can actually have more nutrients than fresh? That’s because when you’re buying something like mangos out of season, they’re most likely traveling to your store from a place where they are in season, like South America. The farmers know that the produce is going to take 2-3 weeks to get to its destination, so they pick the fruit early, letting it ripen on the trip over so it’s just right by the time it gets to you. But ripening on a truck is not the same as ripening on the vine; it’s not getting any additional nutrients as it develops, it’s really just dying slowly. If the fruit is destined to be frozen, however, the farmers leave it on the vine until it’s perfectly ripe, then pick it and freeze it immediately. Some nutrients are lost in the freezing process, but not as many as are lost by picking the food so many weeks early. Moral of the story: buying frozen fruits and veggies isn’t unhealthy, and might even be healthier than fresh depending on the food and the time of year. (Canned, however, is never going to be the best option.)

Okay, enough with the nutrition lesson. Let’s get back to our dessert that’s loaded with carbs and sugar, shall we? Whisk your sauce gently with a fork to make sure all the sugar is dissolved. You want the sauce to be warm, but try to avoid boiling it, otherwise all that sugar will start to carmelize.

Because we don’t want the coconut milk to reduce by boiling, we’ll need to thicken it just a bit with 2 teaspoons of corn starch (or potato starch, or arrowroot) dissolved into 1 Tablespoon of water. Once the corn starch is totally dissolved in the water, then it’s safe to add it to the pot without fear of lumps. Make sure to keep stirring as it thickens.

Round about this time, your rice should be done cooking. Gently fold in your mango pieces. (If you started with frozen, you will want them to be thawed before you do this.)

Serve with frosting — er, I mean, coconut sauce drizzled on top. Seriously, this stuff is sweet enough to put you into diabetic shock. But that doesn’t stop me from putting on way more than a drizzle, if you know what I mean. It’s just so delicious! You could also make this with bananas, or even pineapple, if your kids aren’t into mangos.

Happy Eating!

Mango Sweet Rice

1 cup sweet (or short-grain) rice
1 3/4 cups water
1 can coconut milk
1 TBS brown sugar
1/4 tsp salt

1-2 mangos
1/4 cup brown sugar
1 tsp vanilla
2 tsp cornstarch