EFFORTPOST chiobu's Silky Cantonese Congee recipe - comfort food for the winter

When it comes to comfort food, congee (or rice porridge) is one of my favourites. It used to be poorcel food when people didn't have enough rice, since cooking rice in a lot of water would make the end product appear a lot more filling to the poorcels Because of this it's considered a taboo to have it during the Lunar New Year because it's unlucky or something like that, however in modern times you'll find that the humble dish is often elevated with expensive ingredients like abalone, dried scallops and whatnot

Having said that it's still more common to find it paired with more common ingredients like shredded chicken, minced pork, sliced fish and century eggs because we're a bunch who might just want an affordable and yummy meal For the Chinese there are generally 2 types of congee or porridge, one would be the Teochew version that's basically just water in rice, and the other would be the Cantonese version that's silky and thick, and we will be focusing on the latter version because that's the one I like

While I'm aware of the fact that there are no winters in Singapore and it's hot as heck, it's still a popular dish here especially for breakfast. You'd see long queues and long waiting times at the popular outlets here everyday still, so I can only imagine and be envious of how nice a warm bowl of congee during a real winter

The recipe I'm using is for the plain version of it without meat or anything so it's up to your imagination what you want to pair it with. The usual salt and pepper seasoning would probably work with most types of meat that you'll just dunk in the pot when it's 10ish or so minutes before the congee is done cooking.

Ingredients are simple:

• Rice (any type is fine but Thai Jasmine rice probably works best IMO)

• Water (I use a 8:1 water to rice ratio because I like it thiccc but you can use more water if you prefer)

• Ginger

• Spring Onions

• Cilantro/Coriander Leaves

• Chicken Stock/Bouillon

I've not listed the amount you'd need because in cuisine we would usually just eyeball an amount that's required according to our preferences lol, but if you really need a visual guide here's the amount of aromatics/garnishes that I've prepared for a serving of 2-3 bowls of congee. Ignore the dried scallops because I don't know how accessible they are to get for westoids and they're expensive, but if you're able to source for it then go for it I guess (crush the dried scallops into smaller pieces, soak it for 10 minutes, use your hands to shred them even more before finally dunking them into the pot 10 minutes before the congee is done)

Steps:

1. The trick to getting your congee silky and thick is that the rice grains need to burst or something like that while cooked, so we will be soaking the rice in water first to get that effect. Rinse the rice 2-3 times first before soaking it in water for 3-4 hours (it probably doesn't need to be this long idk). Some of the recipes I've seen say that it's not necessary to soak the rice grains if you use the right type of rice, while others would instruct you to freeze the rice the night before. They might be right so you could try it if you're short on time but I'll be doing the trad way of soaking the rice so don't @ me if it turns out bad using the other methods

2. Once you're done soaking the rice, boil water that's 8 times the amount of rice you're gonna cook, but it's really up to you if you want to add more water later if you don't like it to be too thiccc Once it boils I'd toss a couple of chicken bouillon cubes and stir until it's dissolved. Canned chicken stock or powder would probably work too but bouillon cubes are just more convenient IMO. They look like this if you're confused:

3. Throw the rice in and stir for it for a bit like 10-20 seconds and then leave it to cook for approx. 25 or so minutes without touching what's in the pot because apparently that helps the rice not to stick to the pot or something like that

4. Once 25 or so minutes are up, whisk the rice in the pot for 2-3 minutes until you can see it getting thicker

5. The dish is technically done after you're done whisking but I like it really thick so I'd leave it to cook for another hour or so, but I would add in the ginger and any meat/fish/seafood accompaniments 10 minutes before the hour is up and stir it around for a bit, it's really a preference and time thing. This is the thickness of my congee at the end of it all:

6. Garnish it with spring onions and cilantro/coriander leaves and you're done! The yellow/golden things are dough fritters (Chinese churros I guess) which go perfect with congee and I personally love to spice it up by dousing a lot of pepper in it

It might look plain and boring but because the rice grains have burst they absorb the flavours of the other ingredients cooked along with it, which in this case would be the chicken bouillon and dried scallops, so it's a real burst of flavours happening when you take a mouthful of congee. Furthermore it's easier to digest than normal cooked rice so it's the dish you usually see asians serve to people recuperating from illnesses or something like that

!jannies please pin effortpost