Sticky rice snack

STICKY RICE TRIANGLES WITH FRUIT AND YOGHURT 

In Asia, we make loads of dishes with glutinous rice. We steam the rice, at times flavouring it with coconut milk, colouring it yellow with turmeric or blue with bunga telang (a blue flower), and eat it with curries, layer it in a dessert, wrap it around sambal and roast it... the list goes on. There are really a lot of dishes cooked with glutinous rice over here.

Frying it, however, is a little unusual as far as I know (and if I'm mistaken, please let me know). I can't think of a single Malaysian dish in which the glutinous rice is fried. I suppose it's because sticky rice is already so heavy, and frying it would only make it sickeningly rich. We may love our food, but even we know our limits.

But I do remember reading a recipe in an Australian cookbook for deep-fried sticky rice. I don't have an actual recipe, and so simply winged it. It's not a snack I would have very often, but it didn't turn out badly. The fruit and yoghurt make it seem lighter, and I didn't feel like I was just clogging my arteries.

Crispy Glutinous Rice Triangles

Serves 3-4

1 cup (200g) white glutinous rice

1 cup (250ml) water

¼ tsp rosewater

Chickpea flour

Vegetable oil for deep-frying

2 tbsp caster sugar

¼ tsp ground cinnamon

Pinch ground cardamom

Place rice in a bowl, cover well with water, cover, stand overnight.

Grease a 7cm x 7cm square slice pan. Drain rice, combine with 2 cups of water in medium heavy-based pan, bring to boil, reduce heat, simmer, covered, about 40 minutes or until liquid is absorbed and rice tender. Stir in rosewater. Press rice firmly into prepared pan, refrigerate until cold.

Turn rice onto board, cut into triangles. Dredge in chickpea flour; tap off excess. Deep-fry triangles in batches of hot oil until crisp and browned. The rice is already cooked, so as soon as the outside starts to brown, remove from oil to prevent the triangles from becoming too hard. Toss in combined sugar, cinnamon and cardamom. Serve warm with fruit, ice cream or Greek yoghurt.