Champorado

A chocolate rice porridge eaten with salted dried fish, which is the point.

Fish. Not vegetarian — contains fish.

Ingredients

• 250 g glutinous rice
• 6 discs tablea, or 120 g dark chocolate, 70 per cent
• 1.2 litres water
• 80 g sugar
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 200 ml evaporated milk
• tuyo (salted dried fish), to serve

Method

1. Rinse the glutinous rice once and no more. It needs its starch — that is what makes a porridge rather than a soup — and washing it three times as for plain rice is wrong here.
2. Simmer it in the water, stirring often, for 25 minutes until the grains have burst and the whole thing is thick.
3. Add more hot water if it tightens too far. It should fall slowly off a spoon.
4. GRATE THE TABLEA IN AND STIR UNTIL IT HAS DISSOLVED COMPLETELY. Tablea is pure roasted cacao, bitter and gritty, and it is not drinking chocolate — if you substitute, use a 70 per cent dark chocolate and cut the sugar.
5. Add the sugar and salt and cook 5 minutes more.
6. Serve hot with the evaporated milk poured over at the table, unstirred, so it marbles.
7. AND SERVE SALTED DRIED FISH BESIDE IT. Chocolate porridge with salt fish sounds wrong and is the whole reason the dish is loved: the tuyo is eaten in the same mouthful and the salt is what stops the sweetness cloying.

Our own recipe. This one was written for this site rather than taken from anywhere, so there is no source to point you at. The quantities and the order of the steps are choices, not the only way to do it.

Filed under Philippines · All recipes