Rice Pudding

This is a favorite dish of my childhood – although honestly I don’t recall my mother ever making it. She must have, right? I’ve made it a few times – to do it “right” it probably needs to be like custard, baked in the oven in a water bath, but who has time for that, amirite? Of course there’s an Instant Pot recipe for it, like here, and here and here. The first one I found said to use basmati rice, and since all I have is converted rice, I kept on searching. I found several that did pretty much the same thing: cook the rice in milk and water using the Porridge setting, add sweetened condensed milk and Bob’s yer uncle. I even googled Arroz con Leche (Instant Pot) to see if there were any changes – nope, all pretty much the same. Like, pretty much identical. So without doing any more research (like, to give credit to the first recipe posted), I dove in.

The above photo is post-cook. I had cream but no cow milk, and I had almond milk. So I used 1 cup of each, plus the water. I’m not familiar with the “porridge” setting, but it takes longer than the “rice” setting – 20 minutes after pressure is reached.

Print Recipe

Rice Pudding/Arroz con Leche (Instant Pot)

(No Ratings Yet)

Loading...

Ingredients

• 2 cups milk - I used 1 cup cream and 1 cup almond milk
• 1 1/4 cups water
• 1 cup rice - rinsed - I used converted/parboiled (Zatarains)
• 1 teaspoon cinnamon
• some fresh grated nutmeg
• 1 can sweetened condensed milk (see notes)
• 1 teaspoon of my famous homemade Mexican vanilla
• salt (I actually didn't use salt but the recipes I found all call for it)
• optional mix-ins: dried cranberries, raisins, dried or fresh blueberries, fresh strawberries

Instructions

1

Rinse the rice - this is a crucial Instant Pot step to get the right consistency. I didn't try it unrinsed, I'm just going by what I've read.

2

Put the milk, water and rinsed rice in the Instant Pot, add cinnamon/nutmeg, stir to mix.

3

Cover and put the switch thingy to seal, not vent.

4

I used the Porridge setting which was 20 minutes, as recommended in all the recipes. Just cooking rice in the IP can be done as little as 3 minutes - no idea why so much longer. Maybe to make it creamier.

5

After the IP beeps that it's done, allow the pressure to release naturally for 10 minutes, then open the vent to fully release. If you're an IP novice, beware the steam coming from the vent - hot. Hot.

6

Remove the lid and pour in the sweetened condensed milk and vanilla. Stir to mix it all up and

7

BOB'S YER UNCLE

Notes

One 14-ounce can of sweetened condensed milk is roughly the same as 7 ounces of evaporated milk and 7 ounces (which is about 1 cup) of granulated sugar. I plan to try it again with less sugar instead of sweetened condensed as it was tooth-achingly sweet.

I think it came out with too much liquid – the photos in the links I provided all show a lot more rice and less milk. I wonder if making it with the sugar in the mix and not adding sweetened condensed milk would make it better – see the recipe notes. It’s good – exceedingly rich (duh, cream!) and sweet. Here’s a photo of my beloved homemade Mexican vanilla which I need to top up. I made vanilla before the Huge Vanilla Bean Price Increase, and hopefully it will last while vanilla bean farmers the world over scramble to catch up with the demand so the price comes back down.