So once in awhile, when I’m at home, my dad makes congee, or porridge. He says it’s to detoxify our system, although how well it actually works depends on the person, I suppose. We normally have it with only white rice and side dishes from his home village, Shantou, China. Unfortunately, though, I only have it here with random side dishes picked up from the local Asian supermarket.

This multi-grain congee though, sometimes has enough of flavor by itself, so if you choose to, you could probably have it plain. It’s got a very…well, grainy flavor. It’s not something that’s a medley of flavors, but has a clean and natural taste, and it’s good if you’re just tired of eating out.  It’s also incredibly easy and you can multitask at the same time while preparing and cooking the dish. As usual, more behind the jump.

Recipe

Ingredients

~3.5 cups of water (more is better than too little, so 4 cups ought to be fine as well)

0.5 cup of white rice

0.25 cup of red rice

0.25 cup of black eyed peas

Instructions

1. Wash the red rice and black eyed peas until they’re clean. Soak them for as long as possible (I even soak them over night). But, if you forget, it’s also possible to just wash and toss them into the pot.

2. Pour the water into the white rice and swirl. Add the red rice and black eyed peas and mix.

3. Pour into a pot and turn the stove to high and boil. Stir occasionally and make sure it doesn’t boil out of the pot.

4. You can tell it’s done when the grains are split and the liquid thickens (I think it was ~20 minutes, but it’s better to check often to make sure). Be careful not to boil it for too long or might just seem like really soggy grains at that point. You can also remedy this by simply adding more water, but it might water down the original taste of the grains.

5. Eat!