You want this lukewarm, when the skin has just formed: rice cooked in milk and lemon until the grains give themselves up, yolks stirred in off the heat, cinnamon drawn in a lattice on top. That lattice is your handwriting. Do not skip the skin; it is part of the pudding.
Arroz doce is the pudding of every Portuguese feast — baptisms, Christmas, the table when there is something to mark. It is a home pudding, not a restaurant one. The lemon peel comes out; the yolks go in off the flame so they do not scramble.
Use short-grain rice that will surrender. Serve warm or cold, never steaming. A glass of Moscatel if the feast is still going.
Method
- 01
Put the rice in a heavy pot with some of the milk, the lemon zest, and the cinnamon stick. Simmer gently, stirring often, until the rice is very soft, adding more milk as it drinks — 30 minutes or so, and a watchful spoon, or it will catch. The grains should give themselves up completely; you are making pudding, not pilaf. Fish out the lemon peel and the cinnamon stick when the rice is tender.
- 02
Stir in the sugar and let it dissolve into the hot rice. Taste: it should be sweetly lemony, with the cinnamon still lingering from the stick. If it seems stiff, add a splash more milk — the yolks will thicken it further, and a pudding that sets like cement is a failure of nerve. Keep the heat low; sugar burns quickly at the bottom of a pot.
- 03
Take the pot off the heat. Beat the yolks in a bowl, stir a spoonful of hot rice into them to temper, then beat the yolks back into the pot. Return to a low heat for 1 minute, stirring constantly, until the pudding looks glossy and a little thicker. Don't let it boil — scrambled yolks in rice pudding cannot be undone.
- 04
Pour the pudding into a shallow dish and let a skin form — do not skip the skin; it is part of the pudding. Draw a lattice of ground cinnamon across the top with your fingers or a small sieve; this is the cook's handwriting. Serve lukewarm, when the skin has just set, or cold — never steaming. A glass of Moscatel if the feast is still going.
