Bodhi Day Dish - Kheer (Rice Pudding)

When Sujata brings an offering of "rice milk" or "rice pudding" to leave for the spirit of the sacred fig tree and instead finds a skeletal Siddhartha instead, she says "May your wish come true as mine did." With this offering, Siddhartha turned away from a path of extreme asceticism and began his final push for awakening.

Looking around the Internet, I see it opined that the "rice pudding" that Sujata brought as an offering was likely kheer. A sweetened rice and milk mixture.

Ingredients

• 3 1/4 ounces of Basmati rice

  • Substitute any starchy raw rice as needed.
    • The particular choice in India is usually regional.

• 4 cups of whole milk

  • Substitute almond or oat milk as needed - Konshō has made it with Oatly (brand).

• 6 ounces of sugar

  • Traditionally this could be regular sugar, rock sugar ("mishri") or "jaggery" (which includes ghee)

• 6 green cardamon seeds, ground coarsely

  • Substitute 1/4 to 1/2 tsp cardamom powder
  • Substitute other aromatic spice such as nutmeg or bergamot

• A few strands of saffron

  • Optional: 1 teaspoon of rose water

• Garnish: nuts such as slivered almonds, cashews, or pistachios

• Optional: raisins

• Optional: ghee

Instructions

• Soak the rice in water for half an hour.
• Soak saffron strands in rose water (or plain water if preferred)
• Slowly boil the milk in a thick-bottomed pan
  • Stir constantly, until reduced to ~1/3 of original volume
• Drain rice and add to the milk reduction
• Simmer for 7 to 8 minutes
• Mix in sugar
• Sprinkle spice (ground cardamom seeds, or nutmeg, or bergamot) over the mixture
• Add garnish (nuts, raisins, etc.)

Other Notes

Ratio of Rice to Milk:

Traditionally made Kheer & Payasam has a predefined rice:milk ratio and this is what most people follow. ¼ cup rice for every 4 cups (1 liter) full fat milk is the gold standard. However you can go up to ½ cup rice to cut down the cook time, meaning your pudding will thicken faster but will be less rich. Add evaporated milk to compensate for the richness. ~Swasthi Shreekanth, https://www.indianhealthyrecipes.com/rice-kheer-recipe-chawal-ki-kheer/