deconstructed cottage pie

I used to have an Australian cookbook and there was a recipe similar to this in there. Similar, but anyway, I just went on a cooking spree and used whatever I had on hand tonight.

Rather than making a casserole and peeling potatoes to mash them, I threw the meat-veggie sauce on top of microwave-baked taters. Feel free to use your proper oven as you have time. I was in a bit of a rush. (The sauce would probably be even better if you got it going and let it simmer while you actually baked real baked potatoes.)

You'll need:

• about 450 g (1 lb.) ground beef/pork mixture
• 1 chopped onion
• 4 minced garlic cloves
• olive oil
• 1/4 head of cabbage, sliced thinly
• 1 small bag (250 g) frozen peas
• handful fresh parsley, chopped
• 2 tablespoons Worcestershire sauce
• 4 tablespoons tomato paste
• 1/4 cup ketchup
• 2 teaspoons chunky sea salt
• 1 teaspoon coarsely ground black pepper
• shake of cayenne pepper for warmth

Do this:

Saute your onion and garlic in olive oil till toasty and fragrant and soft, toss in the cabbage till wilted, then add the beef/pork and stir till broken up and browned. Throw in the peas, parsley, Worcestershire sauce, tomato paste, ketchup, salt, pepper, and cayenne. Let it bubble while you deal with your potatoes (1 per person).

When soft, split a potato on each plate, dollop a little butter and sprinkle a little salt and pepper. Cover with a heaping spoonful (or several) of meat sauce.

This'll warm yer bones. 

faux-roccan chicken

Not exactly Moroccan, but as close as Ameri-Brits in Japan could get.

This was a kitchen-collaboration with my younger Bean, and we had fun putting it together. A Mamatouille-J-Bean original. Enjoy!

You'll need:

• 2 chicken breasts, chopped into bite-sized pieces
• 1 onion, chopped
• 7 cloves garlic, peeled and sliced thinly
• olive oil
• cooking alcohol such as white wine (I used sake)
• a handful of fresh parsley, chopped
• 1 15-oz. (425-g) can chopped tomatoes
• 2.5 teaspoons Moroccan spice (includes salt, pepper, garlic, paprika, rosemary, turmeric, cumin, and coriander)
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 teaspoon chunky black pepper
• 1/2 teaspoon coriander
• 1 teaspoon cinnamon
• 1 teaspoon powdered dried yuzu (citron) or other citrus peel
• 2 small lemons, juiced

Do this:

Saute your onions in olive oil until brown, then add the garlic and stir for a bit. When the garlic is a bit browned, pour in about 1/4 cup of cooking alcohol and let it steam off. Throw in a little more oil and then brown the chicken in the pan with the onions and garlic. It doesn't have to cook through at this point, just enough to get a little color. Now toss in the tomatoes, parsley, Moroccan spice, salt, pepper, coriander, cinnamon, and dried citrus peel. Simmer for as long as you have time (and make sure the chicken isn't pink in the middle--this doesn't actually take long).

At the very end, just before serving, add the lemon juice and stir through before spooning it all on rice with a side of roasted broccoli. We had pineapple for dessert, and the elder Bean had his in a yellow bowl. He said the pineapple was camouflaged.

coconut-flour apricot-pear crumble

Fresh out of the oven!

We've had a long bout of bronchitis passed around among the four of us, and now that we're looking at it from a different angle (not a completely well angle, but a we-have-slightly-more-energy-angle), I actually remembered that I have a food blog. {Hello, Mamatouille! I've missed you, girlfriend.}

This is a Mamatouille original, concocted in love and in dessert-longing. 

You'll need:

• a 15-oz. (425-g) can each of apricots and pears (or fresh, if you've got them), and save the apricot juice for later 
• a splash of lemon juice
• 3 eggs, beaten
• 1/4 cup coconut flour, sifted
• 1/4 cup oats
• 1/4 cup brown sugar (I used Okinawan "black" sugar)
• 3 tablespoons melted butter or coconut oil
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1 teaspoon cinnamon
• 1/2 teaspoon powdered ginger
• 1/4 teaspoon nutmeg
• 1/4 cup chopped walnuts

Do this:

Preheat your oven to 350 F/170 C.

Chop the fruit with tender loving care, popping the occasional apricot treat into your happy gob. Chef's perks.

Grab an 8x8-inch pan, metal or glass, and place the fruit randomly and beautifully in the bottom. Sprinkle some lemon juice over all (just enough to add a bit of tang but not enough to make some kind of funky chunky lemonade).

In a big mixing bowl, beat your eggs with the vanilla extract and melted butter or coconut oil, then stir in the sifted coconut flour, oats, brown sugar, spices, and walnuts.

It will get hard to stir pretty quickly (coconut flour tends to do that), but don't worry. Blend as best you can and then dollop it on the fruit.

Bake approximately 25-30 minutes, until everything is bubbly and browning. Watch carefully to make sure it doesn't go beyond tan to blackened.

Sprinkle with a little of the reserved apricot juice if you so desire.

tuna curry pasta salad

What do you do with leftover cooked pasta? I had a brilliant brainzap!

Open some tuna cans and get creative...

You'll need:

• about 4 cups cooked pasta (I used Thai rice noodles)
• 2 cans tuna (70 g or 2.5 ounces each), drained
• 1/4 c. raisins
• 1/4 c. chopped walnuts
• 1 t. curry powder
• 1/2 t. turmeric
• about 1/2 c. mayo, or just enough to moisten
• 1/4 t. sea salt
• 1 t. freshly grated ginger

Do this:

Put it all in a large bowl and mix together. That's it.

Then fridge it till you're ready (we had it the next day for lunch with a little chopped green onion sprinkled on top, with carrots, tomatoes, cukes, and pastrami on the side).

dairy-free ice-cream-maker-free bananaberry ice cream

For the life of me, I can't find where I got this recipe. Forgive me if it's from your blog, but I have absolutely no clue about its origin. I wrote it down some time ago and finally got around to making it.

Why didn't I do this before?

You'll need:

• 2 bananas, frozen and sliced
• 1/2 cup frozen berries
• 2 T. almond milk
• 1/2 t. vanilla

Do this:

Blend the berries and bananas in a food processor till slushy, then add the milk and vanilla in and swirl again till it's smooth and creamy.

Then dig in! I ate it while reading To Kill a Mockingbird. 

I doubled this recipe for four people, but we had leftovers and I froze a couple small portions for the Beans, which they consumed enthusiastically after a long bike ride the next afternoon.

zingy gluten- and dairy-free apricot crumble

More oven usage! Yippee! I'm so excited to have my oven up and going and working for me. It's been a long time since I had one.

This was last night's just desserts.

You'll need:

• 1 15-oz. (425 g) can of apricots (save the juice!), or fresh if you have them
• lemon juice, for sprinkling
• 1 cup oats
• 1/2 c. almond flour
• 1 t. cinnamon
• 1/8 t. nutmeg
• 3 T. Okinawan black sugar (or regular brown)
• 4 T. melted coconut oil
• 1/8 t. salt
• 3 T. chopped crystallized ginger

Do this:

Drain your apricots, reserving the liquid. Chop the apricots into bite-sized pieces, and lay in the bottom of a pie plate or other oven-proof dish. Sprinkle a little lemon juice over the top to add zing!

For the topping, add your oats, almond flour, cinnamon, nutmeg, black (or brown) sugar, salt, and crystallized ginger to a bowl, stirring till mixed. Then drizzle over the melted coconut oil and squish it in with your fingers or the mixing spoon.

Sprinkle the topping over the apricots, then bake at 180 C/350 F for about 30 minutes, till the topping is crispy and a wee bit browned and the apricots are bubbly and luscious. 

simple savoury summer "parfaits"

This is so quick, easy, and refreshing for summer. Takes about two minutes to put together, tops. An easy side to go with a main dish of hot weather. (If you eat dairy, some chopped mozzarella would be a superb addition, methinks.)

Layer sliced cucumbers, chopped tomatoes, and fresh basil in a glass, sprinkling a tiny bit of sea salt on each layer as you go. Then whisk a teaspoon of extra virgin olive oil with a teaspoon of balsamic vinegar and a pinch of sea salt, then pour over a couple of cups.

I like to stripe-ify my cukes with a veggie peeler before slicing. More fun that way!

natural pain management (with help from my kitchen, of course)

At the suggestion of my friend Julie, I'm jotting down a few ways that we naturally manage pain round these parts. My sister and I were hit by a drunk driver in a hit-and-run car accident when I was eighteen, and I've been dealing with neck and back pain ever since. My husband Stephen also deals with pain as he sits at a desk and works on a computer for a crazy number of hours every day. Some of these suggestions came out of his research and some were recommended to us.

• Walking. We try to do this as often as possible, and up and over mountains is even better.
• Using our trampoline (or rebounding, as it's now called). We've got a mini one, and I do at least 500 jumps at one time, making up different crazy ways to dance, jump, and swing my arms. It really does bring me joy!
• Pete Egoscue's book and/or CD called Pain Free. We couldn't do without our maintenance routine, and when we have specific pain (neck, back, shoulder, knee, etc.), there's a chapter for each part of the body and stretches specific to those areas.
• Boswellia and curcumin: natural herbal anti-inflammatories that work like magic. Curcumin is also called turmeric, so make lots of curry and throw tons of that great stuff in there.
• Gelatin: this stuff is wondrous. One of our sons has ligament laxity, and as a result of taking gelatin every day, he's now really strong and his ligament laxity seems nonexistent. No more wobbly body for him. Also, I used to wake up during the night, hardly able to move or turn over because of my lower back pain. After we started taking gelatin, I haven't had this problem at all. I heat up a half a mug of veggie/fruit juice (I actually just use water for me) and dissolve a packet with 5 grams of gelatin in each one at breakfast time, just once a day. You can put gelatin in when you're cooking your rice or a stew, or you could actually make some homemade jello with fruit juice.
• Seven-minute workout: this workout right here. It's grand! (No gym required.)
• Swimming and sitting in Japanese hot tubs work great, too, when you can indulge.

Don't be a pain! Be pain free, using some of these low-cost and low-maintenance solutions. 

oven's maiden voyage: roasted taters

What could be better than digging potatoes yourself and then blessing them with a roasting in your new oven?

Once we finally figured out how to get our oven off "demo" mode (it had been the floor model so it was on that special non-cooking mode--we had to call the appliance shop and they didn't know either, then had to research and call us back), we could then roast those taters

Here we are digging them up just a week ago in the mountains of Kanazawa:

Simple, really: dig and cook.

You'll need:

• scrubbed and chopped potatoes
• olive oil
• sea salt

Do this:

Every oven is different, but I tossed our taters with olive oil and chunky sea salt, then roasted them at 200 C/400 F for about 30 minutes, then turned up the volume to 230 C/450 F for another 13 minutes, and finally, I turned on the grill function for an extra 5 minutes to brown them a bit.

Such fresh-tasting taters, with no mealiness or dryness. 

the creamiest goatmeal

We call it goatmeal round these parts, and here's how I make it.

You'll need:

• 1 cup oatmeal (I think mine is the quick-cooking variety)
• 2 cups milk (I use 1 c. soy milk and 1 c. almond milk, but you're welcome to use dairy, or even goat's milk!)
• 1 cup water
• 1/4 c. dried cranberries
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 1/8 t. nutmeg
• 1/2 t. cinnamon
• 1/4 t. ground ginger
• 1/4 t. vanilla extract
• for topping: coconut oil and honey

Do this:

Cook your oatmeal according to the package directions. I throw everything except for the toppings in the pot at the beginning, because I like my cranberries plump.

After it's all creamy and hot and ready, pour a little melted coconut oil and honey on each bowlful. I served ours with boiled eggs, Japanese in-season white peaches, and some sausages.

flippin' bacon

What flips your bacon? After using cooking chopsticks for forever, I forgot that I used to utilize tongs. How do you turn yours?

In other news, I'm SO excited to start baking again: we bought an oven! I think one of the first new recipes I'll try is this Paleo pie crust from Elana's Pantry. It just sounds so good to me right now.

matcha butter

Oooooh, yeah: Mrs. Yasue's homegrown strawberries made into her homemade jam, and matcha butter made by moi. All slathered on rice-flour bread rolls that I can buy frozen from a local restaurant. To make matcha butter, just soften some unsalted butter and blend in some sifted matcha powder. (Idea from the cookbook New Tastes in Green Tea by Mutsuko Tokunaga.)

mitsuya-cider sweet-and-sour meatballs

What do you do when the sushi chef's wife gives you Mitsuya Cider and you don't normally drink soda? Get creative! (Mitsuya Cider is a non-alcoholic Japanese fizzy drink that tastes a bit like Sprite, but different, too.)

Well, that bottle morphed into amazing sweet-and-sour meatballs, if you can believe it.

You'll need:

• 450 grams (about 1 pound) ground meat (I used a Japanese mixture of pork and beef)
• 1/4 c. almond flour (or binding flour of choice)
• salt and pepper
• 1/2 t. each powdered ginger, garlic powder, and onion powder
• 1/4 c. ketchup
• 1/8 c. apple cider vinegar (I use organic with mother--very flavorful)
• 1 T. Dijon mustard
• more pepper
• 1/2 t. each ginger and onion powders
• 1/2 c. Mitsuya Cider (or Sprite or ginger ale)

Do this:

To make the meatballs, mix the meat, almond flour, salt and pepper, and 1/2 teaspoon each powdered ginger, garlic powder, and onion powder in a bowl, then form into balls.

For the sauce, in a separate bowl stir the ketchup, vinegar, mustard, pepper, 1/2 teaspoon each powdered ginger and onion powder, and Mitsuya Cider.

Cook the meatballs in a frying pan, turning after a little while to brown on both sides. When the meatballs are cooked through, add the sauce ingredients and simmer gently till warmed through. Lovely over rice with some avocado on the side.

gingery-coconut banana dessert

Well, folks, this was completely yum. A Mamatouille original!

It's basically bananas, raisins, and coconut milk, but I added a few extra je ne sais quois touches.

You'll need:

• 3 ripe bananas
• 1 cup coconut milk
• 1 T. coconut oil
• 1/4 c. raisins
• 1/2 t. cinnamon
• 1/4 t. nutmeg
• 1 T. chopped crystallized ginger
• 1 T. chopped candied orange peel
• 1 T. rum

Do this:

Chop your bananas and throw them in a frying pan with the raisins and coconut oil. Heat gently over low-medium flame till the raisins are a bit plump. Add the cinnamon and nutmeg. In the microwave, heat the chopped crystallized ginger and candied orange peel in the rum for about thirty seconds.

Add the ginger and orange into the pan, and then pour in the coconut milk, heating till warmed through.

Enjoy in small bowls with your favorite peeps.

sweet-and-spicy three-bean salad

We had some friends visiting from Seattle, and one of them is vegan. I love beans anyway, so I didn't mind cooking a bit differently for a few days.

This dish involves no cooking whatsoever, though, just some chopping and mixing. Grab some canned chickpeas and kidney beans (or your beans of choice--a mix of colors is pleasant), and some freshly cooked or frozen chopped green beans.

I used Okinawan "black sugar" for the sweetener, and a chopped dried chili pepper for the heat. Mmmm!

You'll need:

• 2 cans (about 400 g each) of different colored beans, drained and rinsed
• 1 cup chopped cooked green beans (can be frozen)
• 1/4 cup chopped onions (can be frozen)
• 1/4 cup diced sweet peppers (I used a combination of red and yellow)
• 1/4 c. olive oil
• 1/4 c. vinegar
• about 1-2 T. sugar
• about 1 t. salt
• about 1/4 t. pepper
• one dried chili pepper, deseeded and finely chopped

Do this:

Toss the beans, onions, chili pepper, and sweet peppers into a bowl. In a measuring cup, mix the liquid ingredients, sugar, salt, and pepper, then stir into the beans. Refrigerate all day or overnight.

The longer you let it soak in the cool tub, the better.

This was the first time I've added heat, and it was perfect. 

gluten-free blueberry-yuzu mug muffins

I honestly can't remember now where I got the idea to make mug muffins in the first place, but somewhere online--um, do you know? {Nobody knows.}

So anyway, I've been riffing on microwave mug muffins in my ovenless kitchen for many months now.

And yuzu fruit is my favorite lately--I use it on fish, in sauteed greens, in desserts. You name it, it's got yuzu in it. (My preciouses.)

You'll need:

• a greased mug
• a beaten egg
• 3 T. almond flour
• 1/4 t. each cinnamon and powdered ginger
• a dash of nutmeg
• 1 T. melted butter
• a spoon of honey and maybe a sprinkle of dehydrated 100% maple syrup flakes, if you have a Canadian friend who shares (luckily I do)
• a splash of vanilla extract
• a pinch each of salt and baking powder
• 1 t. yuzu juice
• 1/4 cup frozen blueberries

Do this:

Using a wire whisk, beat all the ingredients together, then stir in the blueberries at the end with a spoon. 

Microwave a couple of minutes, and presto! Pour on your favorite kind of milk (I use soy or almond), then spoon into your gob. Yummeroony. Blueberries and citrus just go crazy together.

miso potatoes

Leftover mashed taters? A dollop of miso mixed through is umami heaven.

crispy gluten-free yuzu salmon burgers

I'm always working on perfecting my salmon burgers, but I never use a recipe! This is a conjured crispy-outside-and-citrusy-salmony-inside burger.

There were three of us eating these, and I also made homemade sweet potato and white potato mash to eat alongside. This recipe is easily doubled or tripled as needed.

You'll need:

• 1 (180-g) can bone-in salmon (break up the salmon and crush the bones with your fingers)
• 1 beaten egg
• 1/4 - 1/2 C. almond flour, as needed for binding
• 1 T. yuzu juice
• 2 T. Japanese mayo (they use rice vinegar, which adds a nice tang)
• 1/2 t. onion powder
• 1/2 t. garlic powder
• 1/2 t. coarse salt
• 1/4 t. coarse black pepper
• 1 t. dried parsley
• 1/8 C. chopped green onion (can use frozen straight from the freezer)
• rice breadcrumbs or cornmeal for coating the burgers
• olive oil for frying

Do this:

Mix it all up nice and easy in a glass mixing bowl, or whatever you've got, then form into patties and roll in your rice breadcrumbs or your cornmeal. Fry over medium heat in a frying pan until crispy and brown on each side.

Enjoy with some ketchup and your two favorite Beans. Beware: they'll want seconds! 

lovely leftover lunch

What to do with a bunch of salady-type leftovers? Add some canned tuna and go to town!

Here's what I did:

Cooked rice in the rice cooker and made it into a bowl-bed for these lovelies to rest on.

Mixed canned tuna with leftover homemade tartar sauce and cold cooked peas.

Added it on top of the rice along with leftover homemade coleslaw (I tend to throw in quite a lot of green onions to mine to give it a kick) and leftover salad (spicy wasabi leaves, tomatoes, cukes, sugar snap peas, and Japanese "five-vegetable" dressing).

For the green smoothie: blend spinach, bananas, pineapple, avocado, carrot, and coconut milk.

carrot milkshake

So easy and a nice, unusual flavor (recipe from the soy milk package).

Blend 800 ml of soy milk, one carrot, and 2 tablespoons of honey.

homemade chai lattes

A little spice for happy Mundays:

Brew some spicy chai tea, but don't fill up the mugs. Leave about 1/3 of the top free.

Add a little honey if you like. Heat up some milk on the stove, then froth it with a sweet little 100-yen frothing toy. Pour it over the tea and add a sprinkle of cinnamon.

japanese chicken burgers with homemade teriyaki sauce

Here's another recipe based on one by Just One Cookbook. Stephen and I loved her kimchi fried rice, but this one passed with flying colors for all four of us.

Just One Cookbook's original recipe was for chicken meatballs, but I had a little six-year-old helper, and we patted them into more of a hamburger shape. You can click on the above link to see the full recipe, but I did change a few things: I used okara instead of regular tofu, I added in some minced garlic cloves, and I left out the sweet peppers in favor of extra green onion.

Umami factor: 10++++++/10.

kimchi fried rice

I made this quite awhile ago, but man, it's so tasty. I'm imagining eating it again right now, and I see another kimchi fried rice lunch coming up soon. Based on Just One Cookbook's recipe, I pretty much left it just as it was. More, more, more-ish.

gluten-free matcha steamed cakes

I've been really inspired lately to steam a dessert, especially as I have no oven. I also like to keep things gluten free when possible, and I can buy almond flour from my local grocery store here in Kanazawa.

This recipe for a gluten-free steamed pudding with a rhubarb sauce sounds really good, and I hope to make that soon. However, in the meantime, I wanted something small to start with--something in individual sizes and not too time consuming.

Enter Just One Cookbook's green tea steamed cakes. After making her very more-ish kimchi fried rice recently, I knew her recipes were probably all amazing!


Matcha powder and sweet red beans are easy to come by in Japan, so all I had to do was change out a few ingredients to make it a little friendlier for our eating habits.

I mixed up the batter, put half in the bottom of the cupcake liner, put in a spoonful of sweet (organic) red beans, and then covered it with the rest of the batter.

I loved Just One Cookbook's idea to wrap a towel around the lid of the pan--it kept the condensation from coming back down on to the cakes.


The link to Just One Cookbook's recipe is above, and here is how I changed it a bit.

You'll need:

• 1 egg
• 1 T. melted butter
• 1 T. honey
• 2 T. soy milk
• 1 T. sugar
• 1/2 C. almond flour
• 1 t. baking powder
• 1 t. matcha (bitter green tea powder)
• sweet red bean paste or sweet red beans 

Do this:

Wrap your frying pan lid with a towel. Put four ramekins into the empty pan, put water in halfway up the ramekins, then remove the ramekins again and put cupcake liners in them. Start boiling your water.

While you're doing that, whisk the egg, butter, honey, milk, and sugar in a bowl, then sift in the baking powder and matcha powder.

Spoon some batter in the bottom of each cupcake liner, dollop in a spoonful of sweet red beans, and cover with the rest of the batter.

Steam for 12-14 minutes, or until a skewer inserted in comes out clean. The bottom of the cupcake will be a bit squidgy because the beans sink to the bottom, but they are completely delightful. (Just One Cookbook serves the red beans as a topping after the cakes are finished cooking.)

Itadakimasu! 

coconut-milk green smoothie

So easy: spinach, avocado, carrot, fresh ginger, banana, frozen mango, coconut milk. And so creamy, tropical, and lovely.

one-(wo)man coffee

Have you seen these little one-cup coffee filters? In addition to the coffee grounds it comes with, I've just put in some cinnamon, nutmeg, garam masala, and chopped crystallized ginger and candied orange peel. This isn't really gourmet coffee (we don't have a coffee maker), but it's fair trade and from our local Aeon grocery store (store brand).

Are these only in Japan?

thai peanut chicken + rice noodles

Not gonna make this very often because it was a PITA (pain in the...tushy), but it was YUM. Thai rice noodles, chicken, and homemade Thai peanut sauce (homemade peanut butter, garlic, ginger, lime juice, honey, coconut milk, cayenne pepper, and soy sauce). Topped it with some grated lime peel. I want to eat the whole room every time I walk back in and smell the lingering leftover scent. (Sauce recipe from my blender cookbook.) Hooray for national holidays and time to fiddle in the kitchen!

(clean) snow smoothie

Kanazawa snow, blueberries, carrots, cucumber, spinach, avocado, banana, coconut milk, fresh ginger, tangerine, and a smiley face

chestnut-ginger rice pudding with(out) coconut-rum cream

A new development for a new year! Here's hoping 2015 is extra tasty.

You'll need:

• 200 g (7 ounces) cooked and shelled chestnuts, chopped in halves
• a pinch of salt
• 1 c. short-grained rice
• 3 c. soy milk (or your milk of choice)
• 1 t. cinnamon
• 1/4 t. powdered ginger
• 1/4 t. nutmeg
• 1/4 t. cardamom
• 4 pieces crystallized ginger, diced finely
• 1/8 c. honey
• 1 t. vanilla

For the cream:

• 1 can coconut milk, pre-chilled in fridge (open it, scrape the hardened layer from the top and put it in a big bowl, and use the liquidy part for a smoothie or something--put the bowl and coconut cream in the fridge to stay cold till ready)
• 2 t. powdered sugar
• 2 t. rum

Do this:

First of all, a heads-up: watch your pot. Watch it like a hawk--milk enjoys boiling over. It gets a kick out of making a gihugic stinky burned mess on your gas burner. Not that I would know anything about that.

And now on to the actual directions.

I washed my rice to get the extra starch off, then put it in a pan with the milk and salt. I brought it to a lively simmer-boil, constantly stirring, and added the rest of the ingredients as the rice started to soften.

Watch it, watch it, watch it. Wait for it. Stir often to keep it from sticking.

When it's sufficiently mushy, bring your bowl and cream out of the fridge, and using a hand mixer, blend with the powdered sugar and rum. I've tried this with two different brands of coconut milk, and the last batch stiffened up nicely. This one didn't and stayed runny. Either way, delish. Just don't share this part with the kiddiewinks--they can have some cream sans the yummy rummy.

Dollop (or spoon) onto your rice pudding and sprinkle with a little cinnamon for a nice toasty-colored garnish.