Puerto Rican Style Rice Pudding

Puerto Rican Style Rice Pudding Recipe

photo by recipe author

Servings: 10
Preparation Time: 3 hours

1 1/2 cups of organic short-grain rice
1 teaspoon organic whole cloves
2-3 organic cinnamon sticks
5 – 2 inch pieces organic fresh ginger root
4 cups water
16 oz. of organic coconut cream concentrate
1/2 cup organic California raisins
13-14 oz. organic coconut milk*

1. Wash rice and soak in water to cover for 2 hours.

2. Add spices (cloves, cinnamon, peeled & cut ginger) to a large pot with 3 cups of water and bring to a boil. Simmer 15-20 min. Remove spices from pot.

3. Add 1 cup of water, drained rice, coconut cream concentrate and raisins and cook over low heat for 15-20 min. or until most of the liquid is absorbed, without stirring.

4. Add coconut milk and cook 20-30 min over low heat. Continue to stir the rice every 10 minutes or so to keep it from sticking to the bottom of the pot.

5. Spoon rice into a flat serving platter or individual containers and allow to cool at room temperature. Sprinkle ground cinnamon on top. Serve it warm or cold.

* For the freshest coconut milk make homemade coconut milk. (See video at this link.)

Recipe submitted by Ibelisse, Chicago, IL

Submit your recipe here!

Published on March 20, 2013

Tags: Rice|

(2 votes, average: 3.50 out of 5)

6 Comments

Eve November 11, 2013 at 3:11 pm - Reply

Being puerto rican. I make this for the holidays.
To give it more flavor, I just add star-anise and cloves… yum yum… Can not wait to make it

Julie April 8, 2013 at 4:43 am - Reply

Looks great ..I love rice pudding and am going to make mine as you say but using par cooked brown rice. Thankyou!!

Berynice April 7, 2013 at 4:25 pm - Reply

Seems expensive to me with 16 oz of coconut creme concentrate…

Ibelisse March 26, 2013 at 2:36 pm - Reply

Hi, Beth. Sorry your experience with the recipe wasn’t ideal. Puerto Rican Style Rice Pudding isn’t supposed to be creamy/soupy like other rice puddings you may have had. If you prefer it to be more creamy, add more coconut milk. If you boil the spices longer they will release more flavor. Increase the time at your discretion. The darker the water, the more the flavor of the spices will be released. As far as the sweeeter, you’re right. I forgot to include it. I’ve made this with different coconut creams with and without sugar. Any type of sweetner you prefer is fine.

Beth March 23, 2013 at 4:51 pm - Reply

This recipe appealed to me on many levels: I’m gluten-free and dairy-free and it’s rare to see a rice pudding recipe without dairy; also, I’m trying to incorporate more coconut products into my diet for all of the health benefits and the fact that this recipe used an entire jar of Coconut Cream Concentrate was a big plus.  But, I was looking for a dessert for company tomorrow and other than the raisins, it had no sweetener.  

So, I used 1/2 cup of agave.  Also the flavors of the spices (cinnamon, cloves and ginger) used to infuse the water were entirely lost. So I added a tablespoon of vanilla extract which helped somewhat.

I had to cook it for the entire time listed in the recipe to get the rice to the right texture.  For the beginning of the cooking time it was soooo beautifully creamy I was encouraged it would be good.  But, I’m not thrilled with the results.  I’ll serve it with some supermarket Coconut Milk Half & Half because it’s gloppy and needs something to make it creamy like you’d expect rice pudding to be.

Also, I would add the raisins near the end if I made this again.  Which I probably won’t because it’s a very expensive experiment due to the 16 oz of coconut cream concentrate that I could have put to much better use.  

I never was disappointed with any of the recipes on this site before and I could be having an off day.  Hope others try this and comment because if the recipe can be changed or if others try it and love it, I’d give it another try.  

Thanks for your site and wonderful products.  They are always a delight.

Beth March 23, 2013 at 3:53 pm - Reply

I’m in the middle of this recipe and notice that there is no sweetening other than the raisins.  While I hate overly sweet dessert, no added sweetener seems like a mistake.  Is it a typo?