I love this pretty, buttery-yellow dessert. I feel deeply content and nourished while eating this. Cardamom and saffron have stress reducing benefits, so that makes sense. It’s a simple, no frills, no fuss kinda dessert.

The recipe:

1 cup of cooked basmati rice

2 cups milk (cow, coconut, rice, any kind will do)

1 generous pinch saffron

1 tsp ground cardamom

2-3 tsp maple syrup

1 tsp rose water (optional)

Put the milk, saffron, and cardamom into a pot over medium heat. Bring to a boil, then reduce heat and add your rice. Cook for another 10 minutes to extract the color from the saffron. Mix the maple syrup and rose water in then pour into two bowls. This will be thin.

Decreases Vata (add ghee, cinnamon, and nutmeg)

Decreases Pitta

Increases Kapha

Ayurvedic dessert notes:  It’s best to avoid mixing fruits and dairy. Fruit takes about 30 minutes to digest, while dairy can take up to 4 hours to digest. Both sweet fruits and dairy are nice for pitta separately, together they create fermentation in the belly. The fermented foods are sour and hot, which aren’t good for pitta. Alas, I still enjoy dairy and fruit together sometimes… It’s just so dern good!