I have been experimenting with recipes for this delicious pudding since I knew I was pregnant, and my belly started to show. I wanted to make the perfect pudding texture and consistency for my baby birth.
Maybe you are wondering what I am talking about? And what my pregnancy and birth have to do with pudding! And why even preparing pudding is on the baby checklist?
Well in our Lebanese traditions, when a woman has a new child, we prepare the famous Caraway rice pudding called “meghle” in Arabic.
This traditional pudding is made with rice flour, sugar and some special middle eastern spices must importantly the caraway and the cinnamon.
The secret for this pudding to be perfect is the water and rice flour ratio and a good stirring! so the pudding texture be smooth with a perfect creamy consistency and no cracks on top. I tried so many ratios until I got that perfect smooth creamy NO CRACKS pudding.
I will highlight the top secrets for great pudding, so you know on what to focus so you have a great pudding. The must important step not to skip:
- Soaking the pudding mixture on cold for at least 30 minutes to give the rice an opportunity to soak. You can keep soaking up to 1 and half hour.
- Stirring the pudding continuously, you must stir! Keep stirring the pudding until it boil and after it boils is will get thick and harder to stir don’t worry just keep stirring so the pudding have this smooth constancy and don’t crack after it cools down. Because stirring will help the final result and hold the pudding constancy together.
- The constancy of the pudding is manly connected to the ratio. if you use to much water it will be runny and will not thicken right if you use less water it will crack when it cools down and not look good. So, keep in mind the water/ rice flour ratio.
I started with my mum recipe which is amazing! She taught me how to do it perfectly and shared with me all the tips and trick I added few tweaks, and this is the result!
Absolutely delicious pudding with a deep distinct taste from the caraway and spice blend I used. complete this pudding with shredded coconut some nuts like almonds, walnuts, pistachio, pine nuts and raisins and be ready to have your mind blown away with each spoon!
And to make this recipe even better it is healthy! it is naturally gluten free because it uses rice flour and it is vegan and dairy free. This pudding is so nutritious and perfect for a pregnant woman after birth.
It is believed that a group of herbs and seeds that help the woman after birth to improve her milk supply. This groups of herbs are called “galactagogues” that include caraway, ginger, fenugreek and some more. Adding this kind of herbs to your food will help boost your milk supply. And many more foods will help after birth also like almonds and seeds like sunflower seeds and sesame seeds.
So the point is eat this pudding and enjoy it to the maximum because you are not only eating a delicious sweet treat to boost your energy up that is much needed after birth ! but you are also eating a healthy food that is perfect for your after birth body!
I also prepared for my little angel some cute birth gifts all made by me!
after every storm there’s a rainbow of hope. and my baby is that rainbow of hope in my life!
if you want to explore more with the delicious caraway spice you can check out also my healthy banana caraway cookies recipe here! it is vegan, gluten free and super delicious, perfect for kids.
Lebanese Caraway Rice Pudding:
Ingredients
For the flavored water:
- 1 cup water
- 2 -3 leaves of geranium عطرة
- 2-3 pieces star anise
- 1 tsp. anise seeds
For the pudding:
- 1 cup rice flour
- 7 cups water
- 1 cup the flavored water
- 1 tbsp caraway powder
- 1 tbsp cinnamon powder
- 2 ¼ cup brown granulated sugar you can use white granulated sugar also
For the garnish:
- Choice of nuts: pistachio, walnuts, almonds, pine nuts
- Shredded coconut
- Raisins
- Edible roses optional
Instructions
For the flavored water:
- Start this step before hand so the water has enough time to get cold before using. Just add the water with the anise seeds, star anise and the geranium leaves and bring to boil, lower heat, and let it simmer for 5 minutes. Turn off the heat and leave it covered to steam until cold. You can prepare this step the night before.
For the rice pudding:
- In the cooking pot, on cold before putting on any heat. Mix all the ingredients: rice flour, water, caraway powder, cinnamon powder and sugar and whisk it all together on cold till everything is dissolved. Add the flavored water after you drain and mix all together. And let it soak for 30 minutes (you can soak for more if you have time)
- Put on medium heat and keep stirring. The most important thing is to keep stirring. This is the essential step for a smooth pudding beside the right rice flour/water ratio. Keep stirring continuously until it starts to boil. After boiling keep stirring the mixture for 20-30 minutes. you will notice that the pudding is getting thick, don’t worry this is normal.
- Turn off the heat, prepare your serving bowls and pour in each bowl some of the pudding while warm before it gets very hard and sticky to pour. Shake the bowl a little bit after pouring to have a smooth top. Let it rest for 15 minutes on the kitchen countertop, before storing in the fridge until serving.
Before serving sprinkle the shredded coconut on top and garnish with nuts and raisins and enjoy!
Notes
- You can totally skip the flavored water, but it adds so much to the final pudding. If you want to skip, make sure you keep the water / rice flour ratio: 8 cups of water for 1 cup of rice flour.
You can 1 tbsp of anise powder with the rice flour mixture if you want to skip the flavored water it also helps. - When you want to double the quantity make sure you add the stirring time also after boiling, the bigger the quantity is the more time of stirring it needs after boiling. Add 10 minutes each time you double. so, if you want to do this recipe X 2, you need to add extra 10 min of stirring after boiling. You did 3x this recipe you will add 20 minutes and so on.
- For the garnish you can mix and match like you like you don’t have to add all the nuts that I added and you can adjust to your liking, just keep in mind that don’t garnish and store in fridge , garnish just before serving.
- The pudding stays in the fridge for a good week, to store it better you can cover with some cling film to keep the top from drying off.
- Check out “the secrets to great pudding” highlighted up in the article if you had nay issues with the texture or constancy if the mixture so you know what did you do wrong and fix it .