Making Sticky Rice and Mango

Sweet sticky rice with fresh mango is one of the favorite desserts of the customers at my restaurant, Saffron. As summer approaches and ripe sweet mangos are available once more, we will start making it for sale at Saffron during the middle of April as one of our Thai New Year celebration specials.
Sweet sticky rice is also one of the recipes frequently requested by my friends and customers. Here is a recipe using a Chinese steamer instead of the traditional Thai sticky rice cooker.

Makes 4 servings
1 cup Thai long grain sweet rice*
¾ cup coconut cream (recipe from the previous blog entry)
½ teaspoon salt
1/3 cup sugar
1 to 2 ripe mangos, peeled and sliced

Put the rice in a mixing bowl and fill it with cool water. Wash the rice by swirling your hand around and around the rice grains. Drain the water over your favorite plants and repeat twice more. Fill the bowl with cool water and let it soak overnight or at least 3 hours. (If you are in a hurry, cover the rice with hot water and when the water is cool, the rice is ready to be cooked.) You can tell if the rice is ready to be steamed by the color and texture. Soaked chalk-white sweet rice turn slightly translucent and when you push your fingernail through the grain, it should break easily.
Fill the steamer pot ¾ full of water and set it to boil over high heat. Drain the water from the rice completely and transfer to a Pyrex glass bowl. Spread and smooth the grains. Put the rice in the steamer tray over hot boiling water; cover, lower the heat to medium and steam for 20 minutes.
While the rice is steaming, put the coconut cream, salt and sugar in a saucepan and heat over low heat. Stir to mix until the salt and sugar are dissolved. Spoon out 2 tablespoons into a small bowl and set aside.
When the rice is cooked the grains should turned opaque and when you bite into them, they are soft and tender. Transfer the rice onto a large plate and use a spatula to mix the rice over and over 3 to 4 times to let the steam escape. Immediately transfer the rice to a mixing bowl and pour the very warm coconut syrup mixture over the cooked rice. Mix vigorously and cover with a plastic wrap. Let it sit for at least 10 minutes to allow the coconut syrup to infuse with the rice.
Scoop the rice onto 4 serving plates, spoon the remaining coconut syrup over it and serve with sliced sweet mango.

* Long grain rice used for making sticky rice is not sweet. It is labeled as such because most Westerners use the rice to make sweet sticky rice. It is actually glutinous or sticky rice. The people from north and northeastern of Thailand prefer it rather than regular long grain rice.