Horchata
The delicious rice version
Horchata is a lovely lovely drink if you haven’t ever had it. There are actually two versions of Horchata that I have seen, there is a version you can find in Spain made from tiger nut, and there is the version that is common in North and Central America, made with rice. We are going to be making the latter here. The recipe is extremely simple and has a lot of tuneability so you really can make this however you want so let’s jump into it.
Soaking the rice
As I said before, the version I am going to make today is made with rice. So let’s start with 1 cup or 200 g of white rice. I don’t really think the rice variation matters too much, as long as you arne’t using super starchy rice like arborio or Thai sticky rice. Wash the rice thoroughly and then add the washed rice to a bowl with 2 cups of water.
Additionally to this bowl, we wanna add the ingredient which will give the distinctive horchata flavor the cinnamon. Add 2 to 3 cinnamon sticks to the bowl along with the rice.
Altogether, the rice and cinnamon will absorb the water, allowing them to blend to a really fine consistency later. We want to let this soak for at least 6 hours, but preferably overnight.
Blending the rice
The next morning we are ready to go. Now you can see that not only that the rice has swollen up, but also that the water has taken on a murky color due to the rice and cinnamon, totally no problem. Add both the rice and the rice water directly into a blender, and begin to blend. Blend this for a good long while. We need to ensure that all of the rice grains have been broken up, along with any large cinnamon pieces. After about 2-3 minutes of blending my horchata turned out to pretty smooth. Now there are some very fine particles leftover in the horchata, and to me, this is totally in line with the horchata I am familiar with from taquerias in Tucson, however, if you aren’t the kind of person who can abide coffee grounds in your coffee, this may not be your jam. No stress, to get rid of this, use something like a nut milk bag. Just pour the horchata through this, and it should help strain all of the errant rice particles leftovers.
Alright, we are nearly done now. To this blended rice and cinnamon, we need to add two more things. One we need to add a 12 oz or 350 mL can of evaporated milk, which will give a sort of cooked flavor to this. Now if you want to make this vegan, substitute oat milk here. To give a little sweetness as well as more body, we also are going to add half of a 14 oz or 400 gram can of sweetened condensed milk here. Again if you wanna make this vegan, oat milk or a little coconut cream will work well here.
Give this a small taste and for me, this was sweetened perfectly, but I personally don’t have much of a sweet tooth. Feel free to add more granulated sugar to this, if it isn’t up to snuff for you. Alright, the last step is we need to cool this, so I stuck mine in the fridge for about 6 hours, at which point we are ready to go. Alternatively, you could just use ice, but it will water down your horchata a little bit.
Lastly, if you wanna make this into a nice refreshing alcoholic drink, feel free to add a little rum to this, Rumchata is pretty great.
Alright, I hope you enjoyed this video, if you did please consider subscribing or sharing this video. I really appreciate it when you guys do!
Condensed Recipe:
Ingredients:
1 cup [200 g] of white rice
2-3 cinnamon sticks
12 oz [350 mL] can of Evaporated milk
1/2 of a 14 oz can [400 g] of Sweetened condensed milk
Enjoy!