Paprika Chicken with Creamy Paprika Sauce (an easy all-in-one Thermomix dinner)

Last night I got home late after a busy day and didn't have dinner organised, so it was 'Thermomix to the rescue' once again! I had a quick think, and this is what I came up with. Nothing fancy, just an easy and tasty dinner with basic ingredients, that took all of 25 minutes to make. Sometimes that's just what we need when we can't be bothered, right? (It is really yummy though, and the chicken breasts are amazingly tender and juicy when steamed!)

This fed our family of six and there were plenty of leftovers, which is always a bonus since everyone generally wants dinner for breakfast at our house. :)

This recipe is gluten free, and egg free, and if you omit the butter is also dairy free. The sauce is blended with cashews to make it creamy, but if you can't have nuts, see the nut free variation below. I've added some tips for those of you without a Thermomix, so you don't miss out.

Paprika Chicken with Creamy Paprika Sauce

(Serves 6-8)

Ingredients:

Rice
900g water
380g basmati rice

Veges (these are just suggestions, use what you have)
3 carrots, peeled and sliced thinly
200g green beans, topped and tailed
1-2 zucchini, thinly sliced
150g frozen corn

Chicken
600-700g chicken breast fillets, sliced in 2cm thick pieces
smoked paprika powder (approx 1 tsp)
herb salt (eg. Herbamare)
garlic powder (approx 1/2 tsp)
1 Tbsp butter or ghee (optional)

Sauce
60g raw cashews
60g water
2 tsp chicken or vegetable stock paste (my chicken stock paste recipe here)
1 tsp smoked paprika powder

Method:

Pour water into mixing bowl.

Weigh rice into steaming basket and rinse well, then place basket inside mixing bowl.

Place chicken pieces onto Varoma tray and sprinkle with paprika, herb salt and garlic powder, and dot with butter or ghee if using.

Place Varoma into position with lid on.

Turn speed dial to speed 5 for a few seconds to wash the water through the rice. (That's my little trick to make sure the top of the rice cooks well and you don't end up with crunchy bits.)

Begin cooking for 20 mins/Varoma/speed 2 while you cut up the veges, adding them to the dish as you go. (It takes about 10 minutes for the steam to really start filling the Varoma, so it's easy enough to get the veges cut up in that time.)

At the end of the cooking time, check that the chicken is cooked; add a couple more minutes if not.

Remove chicken, vegetables and rice to Thermoservers or serving dishes. (Or if you're having an 
"I don't feel like doing heaps of dishes" night, just leave them in the Varoma and basket and set aside.)

Add all the sauce ingredients to the little bit of liquid left in the bowl. (There should only be about 3cm of water left as the rice has absorbed most of it.)

Blend 1 min/speed 9. Scrape down lid and sides of bowl with spatula and blend again if needed, until smooth. Season to taste.

Serve the rice onto plates, top with veges and chicken, and drizzle with sauce.

Easy peasy! :)

Variations:

Nut free version: I haven't tried this yet, but I think it would be simple to leave out the cashews and add a can of Ayam coconut cream instead, with the 2-3 tsp vege stock paste and 1 tsp paprika powder. Warm it up a bit, 1 min/90C/speed 4. Season to taste.

Non Thermomix version:  Pour 100ml boiling water over the raw cashews and allow to soak (covered) while the meal cooks. Cook the rice in a rice cooker or on the stovetop. Cook the chicken and vegetables in two layers in a steamer, or in a large frypan with a lid, over med-low heat, until done. Blend the soaked cashews with soaking water and remaining sauce ingredients in a powerful blender until smooth and creamy. Season to taste. (Massel stock powder can be used instead of stock paste.)

Spicy BBQ Chicken All-in-One Dinner

 



One of the things I love most about my Thermomix is that it makes super-delicious and super-easy 'all-in-one' meals! (You may have noticed that. There's quite a few on my blog.)

Who doesn't love a meal that's quick to put together, doesn't use up every pot in the cupboard, saves electricity by cooking everything at once, and tastes delicious to boot? Not to mention the fact that steamed veges are much better for you than veges boiled to death in a pot of water. So I tend to make a lot of these 'all-in-one' meals, just varying the layers to use whatever I have. When the cooking time is finished, if there's liquid in the bowl, I often use it to make a sauce to pour over the top so nothing is wasted.

Here's one I made up the other night - chicken thighs cooking in a spicy BBQ sauce, with veges and either rice, potatoes or quinoa cooking in the basket in the bowl, and a sauce made with the juices that are left in the bowl at the end. Very simple, a great mid-week meal. It's a little bit spicy, so adjust the chilli powder to taste!

Spicy BBQ Chicken All-in-One Dinner

1. Mince garlic in Thermomix bowl on speed 7 for 3 seconds:

- 2 cloves garlic

 

2. Add remaining sauce ingredients and mix on speed 5 for 10 seconds:

- 80g tomato sauce

- 60g apple cider vinegar

- 30g butter, ghee or oil

- 2 tsp seeded or Dijon mustard

- 2 Tbspns Tamari

- 2 Tbspns lemon juice

- 20g Rapadura or 15g honey

- 1 tsp herb salt

- 1-2 tsp chilli powder

- 2 tsp smoked paprika

 

3. Pour over chicken thighs in a bowl and marinate for half an hour. (If you don't have time you can just go ahead and cook them.)

- 1 kg chicken thighs, fat removed

 

4. Pour water into bowl, insert rice basket, and weigh in rice/quinoa/potatoes.

- 900g water

- 400g basmati rice

    OR

  350g quinoa (rinsed)

    OR   

  fill basket with thickly sliced potatoes (skin on)

5. Put lid on bowl, with Varoma on top. Add veges to lower Varoma tray, and place the upper Varoma tray on top. Line with wet baking paper, and arrange chicken on paper, drizzling with some of the sauce. Set remaining sauce aside for later.
- sliced veges: carrots, broccoli, green beans, red capsicum... or even just frozen peas and corn if you're in a hurry
- chicken in BBQ sauce

 

6. Start cooking for 20 minutes at Varoma temp, speed 4 for rice or quinoa, or 25 minutes for potatoes. When cooking time is finished, remove Varoma (set it on it's lid to catch drips) and remove rice/quinoa/potatoes and cooked veges to a Thermoserver or covered serving dish to keep warm. The chicken will need a little more time to cook.

7. If you cooked rice/quinoa, there won't be much 'juice' left in the bowl. Add some more liquid by carefully draining the juices off the chicken into the bowl. Also, add the reserved BBQ sauce to the bowl (from marinating the chicken). Replace lid and Varoma (bottom tray will be empty), and cook for another 10 minutes at Varoma temperature, speed 2. Chicken should be done - cut a thigh in half to check.

    If you cooked potatoes in the basket, there'll be lots of water left in the bowl. Tip all but about 2 inches of water out. Add juices from chicken and reserved sauce, replace chicken in Varoma tray, and cook as above.

 

The juices left in the bowl - BBQ marinade is added and it is thickened to make sauce.

8. Remove cooked chicken to another Thermoserver or covered serving dish. Make the sauce by adding cornstarch/arrowroot mixture to bowl and cooking at 100C for 4 minutes, speed 4.
- 2 Tbspns cornstarch or arrowroot, mixed with 2 Tbspns water in a cup

 

 

9. Serve chicken, veges and rice/quinoa/potatoes together, drizzled with the sauce.

 

As you can see, it's very handy to have more than one *Thermoserver!

They'll keep your food hot for up to three hours, so you can make dinner ahead of time and keep it in the servers until everyone's ready to eat. No more cold dinners.

 

* A Thermoserver is a double insulated stainless steel serving dish valued at $60, available only through Thermomix home demonstrations in Australia. 

 

* Special Deal for January 2013 *

You can receive TWO Thermoservers for free by purchasing a Thermomix in January,

and holding your home demonstration before the end of February!

Visit the Thermomix website for more details.

Vietnamese Fish Curry with Sticky Rice

Don't you just LOVE sticky rice? We do! I actually only tasted it for the first time a few months ago at a Vietnamese cooking course run by Geraldine of Rainforest Bounty, and came home and made it for my family, who were instantly addicted! First let me tell you a little about the Rainforest Bounty Cooking School...

Geraldine of Rainforest Bounty Cooking School -

environmental scientist and talented cook!

The Rainforest Bounty Cooking School is in the edge of the rainforest, close to the base of Bartle Frere, on the Atherton Tablelands (about 15 minutes drive from where I live). You can choose from Vietnamese, Malaysian, Indonesian, Laos/Thai, Middle Eastern or Mediterranean classes. It's a 'paddock to plate' class, beginning with morning tea and a chat about the wonderful bounty found in our north Queensland rainforest, and what it can be used for (including sampling Geraldine's gourmet Rainforest Bounty condiments). Then it's on with the gumboots and off to the garden and native fruit orchards to learn more about the local 'bush tucker', gathering what's needed for the class as we go...

 Ingredients for the class are from the rainforest orchard and kitchen garden, together with Rainforest Bounty gourmet condiments, as well as heirloom varieties of fruit and vegetables sourced from local organic farmers, fishermen, gardeners and artisanal producers.

Then it's back to the kitchen where the fun begins...

Making rice noodles and preparing banana flowers for the

banana flower with rainforest lemon salad.

(By the way, you don't eat the purple bits, they're for decoration.

Or the blossoms. Just part of the white, inner leaves.)

I highly recommend the Rainforest Bounty classes - they're a lot of fun and you'll learn heaps! Geraldine has lived, worked and travelled extensively in South East Asia, and is a great teacher. To see more photos, check out my Facebook page.

Anyway, back to the sticky rice... as you can see in the photo above, sticky rice is steamed, not boiled. This is the traditional way of cooking it - in a bamboo mat/funnel kind of thing over a pot of boiling water, with a cloth draped over it to keep the steam in. It must be soaked first for at least six hours. My friend Bel and I were watching the rice being cooked, and thinking there must be a way to do it in the Varoma (steamer) of the Thermomix. And there is! The great thing about it is that you can also cook your curry at the same time as the rice steams!!

I love all-in-one Thermomix meals that make the most of the Varoma, so I was very pleased to find a recipe in the Travelling with Thermomix cookbook that uses this method of cooking sticky rice. (If you're lucky enough to have a copy of this hard-to-get cookbook, the recipe is 'Stewed Beef with Tamarind and Sticky Rice' in the Thai section.) This is a great way to cook rice if you want to cook a lot - you can fit much more rice in the Varoma than you can in the rice basket. Of course, regular rice needs to be cooked in the basket where the water can whoosh through it, but sticky rice cooks perfectly in the Varoma as it only needs steam to cook. Don't forget you need to soak it for at least six hours first though, so plan ahead.

Here's my version of Geraldine's Vietnamese Fish Curry - I've changed a few of the ingredients to make it more to my taste, and converted it to the Thermomix... so it may not be quite so authentic now, but it's still very yummy! Hope you like it :)

Vietnamese Fish Curry with Sticky Rice

1. First, get the rice soaking. I soak mine in the Thermoserver all day, then cook this for dinner at night. You at least need 6 hours of soaking time.
- Glutinous rice (the amount is up to you - you can just use 300g if cooking for a small family, right up to the whole packet for a large family!)
- water to cover

2. An hour before dinner time, start preparing the curry. First you need to make the paste. Mix together in the Thermomix on speed 9 for 15 seconds:
- 2 medium tomatoes, halved
- 1 tsp Rainforest Fruits Jeowbong (this is a prize-winning Rainforest Bounty chilli paste which you can order online; or you could substitute it with a rich, fruity, thick chilli paste of your choice)
- 1 medium red chilli, deseeded (I leave this out as my kids don't like it too hot)
- 2 cloves garlic
- 2 inches fresh turmeric (or 2 tsps dried turmeric powder)
- 1 inch fresh ginger
- 1 inch fresh galangal (if you can find it!)
- 2 tsp palm sugar
- 2 tsp chicken stock paste (great for flavour, but could use fish or vege stock paste)
- 2 shallots (white part only, save green parts for later)
- 1/2 tsp good quality fish sauce
- 1 tsp tamarind paste
- 1 tsp lemon aspen juice (or a squeeze of lemon juice)
- 2 Tblspns gf soy sauce or tamari

3. Pour half the paste into a bowl, and set aside the remaining paste in another bowl. Cube the fish, and leave it to marinate while you prepare the curry sauce:
- 600g fresh, firm-fleshed white fish (cut in 2cm cubes)

4. Heat the oil in the Thermomix on 100 degrees for 2 mins, speed 1:
- 1 Tblspn coconut oil

5. Add the remaining paste and cook for 4 minutes at 100 degrees, speed 2. Meanwhile, strain the water off the rice and tip it into the Varoma dish, poking a hole in the middle for the steam to get through.

6. Add pumpkin, coconut milk and lemon grass to bowl, place Varoma on top, and cook at Varoma temperature for 25 minutes, reverse speed soft:
- 500g pumpkin, cut in 2cm cubes
- 500ml coconut milk (you can make your own!)
- 2 stalks of lemon grass (white part only), bruised (not chopped - just crush with flat side of large knife)... OR, if you can't get lemon grass, chop up the green parts of the shallots and throw them in instead, saving some for the garnish.

7. Remove Varoma and check if the rice is cooked. It will be all stuck together, so don't stir it too much, just push the sides in a bit with a fork if they need more cooking, and re-poke the hole in the middle.

8. Add the fish and paste to the Thermomix bowl, replace Varoma, and cook for 5 minutes at Varoma temp, reverse, speed soft. If you're worried the fish may break up, you can insert the butterfly.

9. Serve it up... If you want to keep the rice 'sticky', serve it next to the curry, as it 'unsticks' once it gets wet. (The kids love to make balls of rice with their fingers and pop them in their mouths - that's half the fun!) Garnish individual serves with sliced shallots.

I hope you enjoy it as much as my kids do!!

Chicken and Cashews with Coconut Satay Sauce and Coconut Rice

Don't you love recipes where everything is cooked all at once, in one pot?  Well, this is one of those all-in-one meals, except it's made in the Thermomix, not a pot - which makes it even better because you can do three or four different things at once!  So while the sauce is cooking in the jug, the coconut rice is steaming in the basket above it, and the chicken and veges in the Varoma tray on top!  This is one of our favourite quick-and-easy meals... when I don't feel like cooking, I can have this on the table in half an hour.  And everyone loves it :)  (Adapted from the Chicken and Cashews recipe in the Thermomix Everyday Cookbook - but with my coconut satay sauce!)

The first 3 steps, marinating the chicken, can be done ahead of time for more flavour - but if you're doing it at the last minute like I usually am, don't worry, it still tastes good!

1. Cut chicken into smallish cubes (about 1.5cm square) or slices and place in a bowl:

- 300g - 400g chicken breasts or thighs

2. Chop in Thermomix bowl for 5 seconds, speed 7:

- 1-2 cloves garlic

- 1-2 cms fresh ginger

  Scrape out with spatula and mix with chicken in bowl.  (Don't wash out Thermomix bowl.)

3. Add to chicken, mix in, cover, and set aside:

- a couple of tablespoons of tamari or soy sauce

- a splash of sesame oil

4. Pour into Thermomix bowl:

- 450g coconut cream (1 tin)

- 750g water

5. Sit lid on top of jug, and rice basket on top of lid. Set scales and weigh rice into basket:

- 400g basmati rice (or less if you don't want that much)

    Remove basket and lid, rinse rice under tap (in basket), place basket in jug, then replace lid and lock into place.

6.  Place Varoma tray on top of lid, tip chicken into it and spread out so there's holes open for the steam to come through.  Start cooking at Varoma temperature, 20 minutes, speed 4.

7. Meanwhile, chop up the veges and place them into the Varoma as it's heating up.  I start chopping the harder veges first and put them in as I get them chopped, leaving the ones like snow peas, capsicum and shallots until the end.  Make sure there's a hole in the middle for the steam to get through.  Here's a list of suggested veges - use what you've got:

- some thin wedges of onion

- 2 stalks of celery, leaves removed, thinly sliced

- 2 carrots, thinly sliced

- broccoli, small pieces

- green beans

- chinese cabbage, thinly sliced

- boy choy, thinly sliced

- red (and/or green) capsicum, thinly sliced

- snow peas

- shallots, sliced and sprinkled on top

8. Sprinkle over the top of the veges:

- some sesame seeds

- a handful of cashews (roasted or raw)

- a dash of sesame oil

- a dash of tamari (or soy sauce)

9. When the time's up, remove the rice (placing in the Thermoserver to keep warm), and stir the chicken and veges, breaking the chicken apart and making sure there are holes unblocked for the steam to get through. Cook for another 5 or 10 minutes on Varoma temperature, speed 2, checking that the chicken is cooked through.  You may need to add a little more water if there's not much left in the bowl.  Once cooked, remove Varoma tray while you finish the sauce.  (Tip: You can take the lid off the Thermoserver with the rice in it, and sit the Varoma tray on top so they both stay warm.)

10. To the juices and coconut cream left in the bowl, add the following ingredients and blend on speed 9 for 1 minute:

- a couple of handfuls of raw cashews

- 1 inch of fresh red chilli (or more if you like it hotter)

- a good handful of fresh parsley or coriander

- 2 cloves of garlic

- 1 inch of fresh ginger

- a couple of tablespoons of tamari (or soy sauce)

- 1 teaspoon of Rapadura (optional)

- a tablespoon of chicken stock paste (or vege stock paste)

(I don't measure - just chuck in what you think, blend it, taste it, and adjust if necessary!)

Serve immediately - rice, chicken and veges with cashews on top, and sauce drizzled over liberally!  

Hope you like it! :)

Creamy Chicken & Brown Rice Soup

This is a very filling soup that my family love - great for a quick winter meal.  Serve with some fresh bread and a green salad, and it will feed about six people for a main meal.  The soup becomes quite thick as it cools down, and could be thinned down a little more with some rice-almond milk if you like.  (We like it thick.)

If you have a big family, or like more veges in your soup, you can add more chicken to the soup (leaving the peas out) and cook at Varoma temperature with the peas and other veges steaming on top. Place the steamed veges in individual bowls and spoon the soup over the top.

1. Grind rice in Thermomix bowl for 1 minute on speed 9. Add almonds and grind 20 secs on speed 9, or until fine. Set aside.
- 50g of raw brown rice
- 50g raw almonds

[Note: raw cashews can be used instead of almonds for a smoother soup]

2. Place onion, garlic cloves, celery and carrot in bowl and chop for 3 seconds, speed 5.  Add oil (or butter) and cook for 3 minutes, 100 degrees, speed 1.
- 1 onion, halved
- 2 garlic cloves
- 1 stalk of celery, quartered
- 1 large carrot, quartered
- 30g olive oil or butter

3. Add chicken and cook 3 minutes, 100 degrees, speed 1.
- 300g cubed chicken

4. Add water, stock paste, rice, and ground rice and almonds, and cook for 30 minutes, 100 degrees, reverse, speed 1.
- 1 litre water
- 2 Tblspns chicken stock paste (made in TMX - see below) or vege stock paste
- 100g raw brown rice
- ground rice & almonds

5. Add parsley and peas, cook another 5 minutes, 100 degrees, reverse, speed 1. Adjust seasonings if needed, and serve.
- handful fresh parsley, chopped
- 100g frozen peas

[Note: if you like it saltier, just add another spoonful of stock paste.  If you're using bought stock powder, you may want to add some tamari for extra flavour.]

Chicken Stock Paste

To make the stock paste, mince up 300g of raw chicken.

Add 300g veges (leek/onion/shallots, carrot, garlic, celery, celeriac - your choice), and a few sprigs fresh herbs (rosemary, thyme, parsley). Chop for 10 seconds on speed 5.

Add 150g coarse sea salt, 1 bay leaf, 50g white wine (or 1 tsp of apple cider vinegar), 1 clove and 5 coriander seeds (or a dash of ground cloves and a dash of ground coriander).

Cook for 20 mins, Varoma temp, speed 2, with simmering basket on top instead of cap.

Replace cap and blend 1 minute, speed 10.

Use 1 tsp in 500g water for chicken stock.

Baked Chicken with Cashew Satay Sauce

This is my favourite 'satay' sauce ever - it's so quick to make, and very tasty! If you don't have time to bake the chicken, you can just add the cashew sauce to stir-fried chicken and veges, or even just veges (and leave out the extra chicken stock).

1. Place chicken skin side up in roasting pan & brush with butter/oil:
- 1 large chicken, cut into pieces, or chicken thighs/breasts
- 2 Tbspns melted butter/ghee/olive oil

2. Bake for about 2 hours at 180° (350°) while preparing sauce.

Cashew Satay Sauce

3. Grind up in Thermomix for about 30 seconds on speed 7:
- 130g raw cashews
- 6 garlic cloves, peeled
- 2 inches fresh ginger, peeled

- 2 inch piece of fresh red chilli (or to taste)
- 1 large bunch cilantro / flat leaf parsley / coriander (or mixture)
- 1 Tbspn extra virgin olive oil
- 40g Tamari
- 40g rice vinegar

- 1 Tblspn chicken stock paste (or some chicken stock powder - eg. Massel brand)

4. Add and blend on speed 8 for 10 seconds:
- 400ml coconut cream/milk

5. When chicken is baked and golden, remove to a pre-heated platter and keep warm. Add to roasting pan and scrape bottom of pan to remove drippings:
- 2 cups chicken stock
- 1 Tbspn gelatin (optional)
6. Pour juices into Thermomix (with cashew sauce) and cook for 5 minutes at 90 degrees, speed 4. Season to taste.

7. Serve chicken on rice with cashew sauce poured over, and stir-fried veges, steamed veges, or salad on the side.

[Note: picture shows sauce which is not as green as usual as I only had a small bunch of coriander - make it as 'green' as you like!]

'Blender Batter' Berry Cake (GF & DF)

You would never guess that this scrumptious cake is made completely from brown rice, would you! It is the most moist and delicious gluten-free cake ever... and it is completely dairy-free and refined-sugar-free too! It is not made with flour, but with the whole, raw grains, ground in the Thermomix, blended with the liquids, then left to soak for a few hours before the other ingredients are added. You could use other grains besides brown rice - see variations at the end of the recipe. I use raw honey for the sweetener, which I buy bulk to save money.

I've adapted this recipe from one in Sue Gregg's "Breakfasts" cookbook  called "Almond Coffee Cake" which is made with her 'Blender Batter Baking' method.

1. Place 200g of rice in Thermomix and blend on speed 9 for 1 minute. Set aside and grind remaining 150g rice on speed 9 for 1 minute. Return first batch to Thermomix bowl. (It's best to grind this amount of rice or grain in two batches so you don't overload the blades.)

- 350g raw brown rice

2. Add the following ingredients and mix on speed 9 for 30 seconds:

- 260g rice/almond milk

- 1 tsp apple cider vinegar

- 50g olive oil

- 280g raw honey

2. Scrape down lid and sides of bowl, and leave batter to soak for a few hours, or overnight, at room temperature. (I prefer to pour it into a glass bowl for soaking.)  If you're in a hurry it can be made without soaking - just add an extra minute of blending once you add the liquids.

3. Oil a large rectangular baking dish. Preheat oven to 170 degrees C (325 degrees F).

4. Add, and reblend for 2 more ninutes on high speed:

- 2 eggs

5. Add to batter, and blend briefly but don't overmix (5 seconds speed 5):

- 1/2 tsp fine sea salt

- 1 tsp baking soda

- 1 tsp baking powder

- 2 tsp cinnamon

- 1/2 tsp ginger

6. Pour batter into baking pan, and sprinkle over the top:

- 1 cup of frozen mixed berries/blueberries

7. Don't rinse out Thermomix/blender; just place into bowl and chop on speed 5 for 3-5 seconds:

- 1 good handful raw almonds

8. Add, and mix on speed 3 for 3 seconds:

- 1 good handful of raw rolled oats (or if gluten free, use 1/4 cup gf flour instead)

- 1 tsp cinnamon

- 2 Tblspns Rapadura

- 2 Tblspns macadamia oil (or other mild tasting oil, or butter)

9. Sprinkle over cake, and place in oven. Cook for about 45 minutes, or until knife or toothpick comes out clean when poked into centre of cake. Enjoy!

Variations:

- Other grains you can use: 1 1/3 cups wheat or 1 1/2 cups spelt/kamut or 1 1/4 cups barley grain.

- Apple cake: Cook 2 cups thinly sliced apples with 1/4 cup water and 1 tsp cinnamon; place on top of batter in pan, then sprinkle topping over (use walnuts or pecans instead of almonds in topping).

- Dried fruit: Soak 1 cup dried apricots or other dried fruit in hot water for 1-2 hrs, until soft; use in place of apple as above.

- Date & walnut cake: Mix together 3/4 cup of diced dates and 3/4 cup chopped walnuts; fold half into batter, and sprinkle rest on top with topping. (Omit almonds in topping.)

- Pineapple cake: Use juice from tin of crushed pineapple instead of rice milk in cake; add crushed pineapple to topping and omit almonds.

Rice-Almond Milk

One of the greatest expenses for those of us who are 'dairy-free' has got to be milk substitutes, such as rice, almond or soy milks. Our family used to go through 2 litres of bought rice milk most days, which cost us at least $2.50 per day. The other day I met a lady who has many allergies, and she buys organic almond milk which costs her $10/litre!!! EEK! So I am very thankful for my wonderful Thermomix, which helps me save money, as well as helps keep us healthy. Here is my recipe for rice-almond milk made in the Thermomix - it's very quick, and tastes good. And it's very cheap! The almonds help the flavour, and add calcium. I buy insecticide-free almonds bulk, for about $11/kilo, and bulk organic brown rice, and you only need a little of each to make a litre of milk. 

If you don't own a Thermomix, try and make friends with someone who does, so you can use theirs! (Ha Ha!) Sorry, but I can't think of any other way to easily make this recipe! If you cook the rice, then blend it, it gets too thick and 'ricey' tasting - I used to try that before I had a Thermomix. Doing it this way, you don't get that thick 'rice-water' consistency.  If you have time (and are thinking ahead), try the pre-soaked method below the recipe, for easier digestibility.


[Note: I was adding 20g lecithin granules to the rice and almonds before grinding, and it does make the milk very creamy, but I've done some research on soy lecithin lately and decided it was safer to leave it out. See this article for more information on lecithin.]


This recipe makes 1 litre of milk - to make 2 litres at a time, just double everything except the water and follow as per recipe; then after whizzing it up, strain into a large jug and add another litre of water and stir.


1. Place in dry TM bowl and grind for 1 min on speed 9:
- 50g brown rice


2. Add & grind on speed 9 for another 30 seconds:
- 40g raw almonds (or raw cashews for a smoother, creamier milk)


3. Add, and cook at 60 degrees, 6 mins, speed 4:
- 1 litre water (or a little more)
- 1 T coconut oil (or other oil - for creaminess)
- 30g rice malt syrup, optional (or honey, or pure maple syrup, or other sweetener, to taste)
- pinch of salt


4. Puree on speed 8 for 40 secs, then strain into jug. (If you want it completely strained, use cheesecloth.) Cool, and enjoy!

Pre-soaked method: Soak rice and nuts in the water overnight, or for up to 24 hrs, then blend with other ingredients on speed 9 for 2 minutes.  Cook as per recipe.

If you want your milk thicker, add more rice, or less if you like it thinner.

You can use the 'sludge' that's leftover in any cakes/muffins/cookies etc, especially the 'blender-batter' ones, or in custard or soup - I pretty much just put it into whatever I'm making next! (Something's always going into the TM, so it generally gets used straight away.) It doesn't leave a lot of 'sludge', just a handful, and less if you use cashews or if you soak overnight.