Risalamande

Ingredients

• Pudding rice200 g
• Milk1 l
• Double cream500 ml
• Almonds — blanched150 g
• Sugar80 g
• Vanilla1
• Cherries — stoned500 g
• Sugar for the sauce80 g
• Cornflour2 tsp
• Sherry2 tbsp
• Salt1 pinch

Salt and spices grow more slowly than the rest: doubling a dish does not double the pepper.

Weight converts to ounces and volume to cups. Grams of flour are not turned into cups, because that depends on how tightly it is packed.

Method

1. 1

   Rinse the rice, cover it with the milk, vanilla and salt and cook an hour on the lowest heat, stirring.

   65 min

2. 2

   Cool the rice completely; stand the bowl in cold water and stir so no skin forms.

   30 min

3. 3

   Scald the almonds, slip off the skins and chop them coarsely, keeping one whole.

   15 min

4. 4

   Stir the chopped almonds, sugar and sherry into the cold rice.

   5 min

5. 5

   Whip the cream to soft peaks and fold it in with a spatula in three additions, without knocking it down.

   10 min

6. 6

   Hide the whole almond in the mixture and chill the pudding at least three hours.

   10 min

7. 7

   Cook the cherries with sugar for ten minutes, thicken with slaked cornflour and serve the sauce hot.

   15 min

About the dish

The rice is cooked in milk until completely soft and cooled fully before the cream goes in. Into warm rice the cream collapses and the pudding sets dense.

One whole almond is hidden in the shared bowl. Whoever finds it gets a present, a marzipan pig, and in Denmark the custom is taken seriously.

The sauce is cherries cooked with sugar and starch and served hot. The contrast of cold pudding with hot sauce is the dessert itself.

Worth knowing

• — Stir the rice often. Milk rice catches faster than any other porridge, and the burnt smell never lifts.
• — Whip the cream to soft peaks, not stiff. Overwhipped, it will not fold through the rice and stays in lumps.
• — Make the pudding the day before. Overnight it sets and the flavour evens out, and Danish families make it on 23 December.

Nutrition

Per serving at the base yield, calculated from the ingredients rather than measured in a lab.

Calories

560 kcal

Protein

11 g

Fat

34 g

Carbs

54 g

More from Denmark

• Frikadeller — Danish meat patties — flat rather than round — fried in butter to a dark crust.
• Smørrebrød — An open sandwich on rye with butter. The order of the layers and the thickness of the butter both matter.
• Stegt flæsk — Slices of pork belly fried crisp, with potatoes and a parsley sauce.