Dreamy Chai Rice Pudding

I seem to have developed a semi-serious addiction to chai lattes. There’s something about the combination of cardamon, cinnamon, cloves, ginger and star anise that is just so lovely and warming. And I adore rice pudding – it’s one of the ultimate comfort foods.

So this Chai Rice Pudding recipe brings together two of my favourites.

This dish was inspired by a conversation yesterday during a long lunch at my parent’s house. One of my aunties had brought along what is essentially an Asian rice pudding for dessert – gelatinous black rice cooked with brown palm sugar and coconut milk.

This led to me reminiscing about the rice pudding I ate in London when I was living there, which was basically white rice cooked in milk with vanilla.

I thought about cooking both the Western and Asian rice puddings and then combining them in a bowl in a yin yang design. As yin yang is about how opposites forces are interconnected and interdependent it would be both a recipe and a political, cultural, and anthropological statement. (Wow. Where did that come from?)

But I wasn’t sure. The yin yang pudding would be very dramatic but would it look a bit, well, twee? And would it taste good or would it be a confused mish-mash of flavours?

Then, as I was driving home, I had a lightbulb moment – what about a chai rice pudding? It would be just like a chai latte except it would contain rice and it would be just like a rice pudding but chai flavoured.

How could it not work?

So I made it this afternoon and I’m still eating it as I type this.

On this day, at this moment, I am completely content.