The Creamiest Old Fashioned Rice Pudding (Aunt Mae's Secret Recipe)
A rich, creamy old fashioned baked rice pudding inspired by a closely-guarded family recipe — and somehow even better than the original.
Servings: 7 quarts
Equipment
- 8 quart dutch oven a heavy-bottomed oven safe stock pot with lid will also work
- 1 wooden spoon
Ingredients
- 2 cups medium-grain rice
- 1 1/2 cups granulated sugar
- 1 gallon whole milk
- 1 quart heavy cream
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 2 tablespoons pure vanilla extract divided
- Cinnamon, for serving optional
Instructions
- Preheat your oven to 300°F. In a 9-quart heavy Dutch oven, combine the rice, milk, salt, sugar, and 1 tablespoon of the vanilla. Stir to combine, cover, and place in the oven.
- For the first hour and a half, stir carefully every 30 minutes. Then set a timer and stir every 15 minutes for another 30 minutes — you'll start to see it coming together.
- Move the pot to the stovetop over your lowest burner and take the lid off. You want barely any heat here — no bubbles, no shimmer, nothing approaching a simmer. Gradually stir in the heavy cream. From here, stir every 5 minutes for about an hour and a half to two hours, until the pudding is nearly fully thickened with just a little liquid left. It'll look almost done before it actually is — keep going.
- Turn off the heat. Stir in the remaining tablespoon of vanilla and let it cool on the counter, stirring now and then. Once it's no longer steaming, cover tightly and transfer to the fridge for several hours. It will thicken further as it chills, but should stay deeply, beautifully creamy.
- Before serving, taste it. Add more vanilla if your heart says so. Sprinkle with cinnamon, if that's how you grew up eating it.
Notes
To make a half batch, halve all the ingredients and reduce the baking time to 1-1 1/2 hours, depending on how you like it (it will be creamier the less time you bake it). Stir it every 15-30 minutes while baking. Move it to the stovetop, add the cream, and stir often until you can see rice in the cream. It may only take 10-20 minutes more. Add the vanilla and remove from the heat while it is still quite creamy; it will thicken a lot as it cools and chills.
It will be quite loose when it's finished. That's what makes it so creamy! If it gets too thick, just add a little more milk or cream to thin it and make a note for next time.
Don't rush the stovetop step. I set a timer for five minutes to stir it, then I just hit repeat until it's finished. I promise, it will be worth it.