Chilled coconut rice pudding with mango, passionfruit and vanilla

The idea for this came from a dinner I did recently with my great friend and amazing chef Peter Gordon, who made a stunning dessert using many of these flavours with tapioca as the base. Not wanting to rip him off completely, we made something similar with rice pudding. Super cold and super creamy, made with wonderful Heilala vanilla and tropical fruits, it eats a treat.

Coconut rice pudding

120 g	Medium grain rice (Main)
3 cups	Milk
½ cup	Coconut cream (Main)
¼ cup	Sugar
1	Vanilla bean, split and seeds scraped

Passionfruit syrup

8	Passionfruit, juice, seeds and flesh (Main)
½ cup	Caster sugar
½ cup	Water
2	Limes, freshly zested and juiced

To serve

2	Mangoes, ripe, flesh diced
1 sprinkle	Coconut chips, toasted, optional, to serve

Directions

Coconut rice pudding

1. Place all coconut rice ingredients into a medium-sized saucepan and bring to a simmer. Cook low and slow for 30 to 35 minutes, stirring often to prevent the rice from catching.
2. Remove from heat once rice is plump and cooked (check after 20 minutes). Rice pudding should still have a runny consistency which will thicken as it chills. Refrigerate until required

Passionfruit syrup

1. Place all syrup ingredients in a small saucepan and cook for 10 minutes on a medium-low heat until you have a light syrup.
2. Remove from heat and refrigerate until required.

To serve

1. Fold the diced mango and passionfruit syrup together in a small bowl.
2. Generously serve the chilled rice into pudding bowls, and top with mango and passionfruit and finish with a little toasted coconut chips for texture.

Chef's tip

No passionfruit? You can sometimes buy frozen passionfruit pulp from specialist food stores.This syrup will also work well with drained, canned lychees.