Coconut Rice !

Rice being our staple food …..we do, try many variety with rice… one of the flavorful & yummy recipes that could top the list is, Coconut Rice !

This coconut rice recipe, today I am going to share needs coconut milk. I got the readymade creamy coconut milk. But for those, who wants to extract the coconut milk from fresh coconut, will give you the method 'how to extract coconut milk' which my mom used to follow.

Coconut Rice !

Ingredients :
Coconut Milk / cream - 1 tin
Rice - 3 cups
Water - 4 1/2 cups
Fresh Mint Leaves - 1 cup
Ginger & Garlic paste - 1 tea spoon
Ghee - 1 table spoon
Oil - 1 table spoon
Roasted Cashew - 5 to 6
Green Chilli - 1 to 2
Salt - As per the taste

&

Whole Garam masala Ingredients :

Bay Leaf - 1 (big) or 2 (small)
Cinnamon / Cassia bark stick - 1
Cloves - 4 to 5
Green / black cardamom - 2
Anis flower - 2 to 3

Ingredients

Preparation :

1. Wash & soak the rice.

2. Take the coconut milk / cream in a bowl. Here there are 2 ways to measure the water / milk for the cooking.

If it is Coconut Milk  CREAM based,

Coconut Milk CREAM based

Add 4 1/2 cups (for 3 cups of rice) of water to the coconut milk cream, so this coconut milk we are going to use to cook the rice.

Coconut Milk

If you have Coconut milk not like cream, directly use the coconut milk instead of water. The measure is 

3 cups rice : 4 1/2 cups of coconut milk , so NO EXTRA WATER NEEDED.

3. I am using pressure cooker to cook coconut rice, you can use any cooking (sauce) pan which has lid. Add oil to the pan and heat, now add the ghee and let the ghee be melted. Add slit green chili, roasted cashew & all the whole garam masala and fry them for 1 to 2 minutes.

4. Add Ginger & Garlic paste and fry for 1 minute.

5. Add soaked rice to the pan & mix well.

6. Add coconut milk to the rice & give a quick stir and add salt.

7. Add the fresh mint leaves & close the lid.

8. Let it cook on the medium to low heat.

Once done, turn off the heat and let it come down to luke warm state and The Coconut Rice is ready to serve with any veg / non-veg korma as a side.

Method to extract Coconut Milk:

- Take freshly grated coconut.

- Boil 2 to 4 cups of water depends on the quantity of grated coconut.

- Turn of the heat & add the grated coconut to the boiled water.

- Let the water cool down.

- Using a strainer, separate the coconut scrape & coconut milk. Now you can use this coconut milk for cooking.