Champorado(Filipino Chocolate Rice Porridge)
Speed - 95%
Simplicity - 100%
Tastiness - 98%
98%
Excellent!!
This chocolate rice porridge is surprisingly great! The touch of dulce de leche on top really went well with the slight bitterness of chocolate.
Ingredients
- 1 Cup Glutinous Rice
- 1/4 Cup Cocoa Powder
- 1/3 Cup Brown Sugar
- 4 Cups Water
- Condensed Milk optional
Instructions
- Boil the glutinous rice in water.
- Dissolve the cocoa powder in a cup of warm water and stir into the pot.
- Simmer the rice for 15 minutes, stirring constantly.
- Stir the sugar into the pot and continue to simmer for 5 more minutes.
- Serve with a swirl of condensed milk or dulce de leche.
Perhaps with very close origins to the Mexican Champurrado, which is a thick chocolate drink prepared with some type of corn flour, this chocolate-enriched rice porridge has been a very common Filipino breakfast and snack favorite. With nothing too fancy nor special, this local specialty is surprisingly excellent. . . well, chocolate does make anything special, doesn't it? In fact, I do love it and would easily classify it as comfort food, serving it hot on a very cold weather.
This dish is so simple to do, you may not even need a recipe for it. Let me talk you through the process anyway.
The distinct thick consistency of this porridge relies on your choice of rice. As its name suggests, glutinous rice has the highest gluten content among all other varieties, and there would be no better substitute for it in this given recipe. Also, glutinous rice would have a more springy bite when cooked compared to more common long-grain varieties, which subtly makes eating this porridge more pleasant.
A little goes a long way. A cup of uncooked glutinous rice would yield about 6 standard cups of champorado. Factoring in evaporation during cooking, you'll need somewhere in between 4 and 8 cups of water for boiling. I suggest that you start with 4 cups, adding in more along the way.
Dissolve your cocoa powder in about a cup of hot water and stir it into the pot. Putting powdered cocoa directly into your pot of boiling water may cause it to clump together.
You may use your favorite chocolate in place of that cocoa powder. In fact, this dish would traditionally be prepared with blocks of chocolate, locally known as tablea.
You definitely know your chocolate more than I do, so I'll leave it up to you to add as little or as much as you want. I could only suggest that you go with less in the beginning, with which you could always add more if you want more flavor.
Bring everything to a boil before turning the heat down to a gentle simmer. The starch from the rice could easily stick to the bottom of the pot and scorch over high heat. Stirring the contents of your pot would also be necessary to keep anything from burning.
It'll be most likely that you'll need to add more water into the pot to keep things from drying up. Don't even bother to get that perfectly measured. . . it would almost be impossible to overcook your rice and possibly ruin your champorado.
I'm sorry to say that you'll have to patiently monitor and stir your champorado for the next 15 minutes or so. You'll be rewarded with a very comforting dish anyway.
When your rice is almost done, stir in the brown sugar and give it about five more minutes to fully dissolve. This sugar will also thicken up your porridge a bit more.
Just as with your chocolate, I do suggest that you add the sugar a little at a time until you get the sweetness you prefer.
This treat would be commonly served hot or chilled with a good swirl of sweetened condensed milk on top. I prefer going a notch higher by adding dulce de leche for a more pronounced caramel flavor which I think goes better with chocolate.
Fish Escabeche
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