Cantonese Congee / Porridge

粵式粥

Unlike Teochew or Hokkien congee/ porridge which are grainy, Cantonese congee is thick and smooth. Cooking a good pot of Cantonese congee takes time but most of it is passive i.e. waiting for the rice to fluff up using residual heat.

Ingredients (2 servings, each in a 7 inch diameter bowl - refer to above fish porridge picture)

100g Thai rice

1.4 litres water

1. Rinse rice and put in a deep pot with water. Bring to boil over medium fire, then lower fire and simmer for 15mins. Then turn off heat. Porridge texture at this stage is as per this picture:

2. Cover the pot with lid and let the porridge fluff up further residual heat for 30 mins. Cover the pot with a towel to trap heat within if you are not using a ceramic/clay pot.

3. After 30mins, porridge texture will look like this:

4. Use a ballon whisk and whisk the porridge rapidly to break down the grains. This is the porridge texture after whisking for 5mins - the longer you whisk, the smoother the porridge. 

If porridge is too thick for your liking, add a bit of water and whisk to incorporate. 

5. To make sliced fish porridge, cook the porridge with fish or chicken stock. After step 4, season the porridge with salt and bring the porridge to a gentle boil over medium fire. Add in fish slices, one by one (do not add the fish slices at one go as they will clump up), use a ladle to gently stir in the fish slices, then turn off the fire. 

6. To make pork meatball porridge, prepare the pork meatballs (click here for recipe) and boil them in a pot of water (about the same amount for cooking porridge). Then use this water (pork broth) to cook the porridge. Once step 4 is completed, season the porridge with salt and add the pork meatballs into the porridge. Here's a picture of pork meatball cum dried oyster porridge: 

Note: Dried oysters added for more unami flavour. Just rehydrate them and replace some of the stock with the soaking liquid.