If you like rice pudding, you're going to love Risalamande, a churched-up Danish version of rice pudding that's full of almonds, velvety whipped cream & topped with a cherry sauce.
I know. I don't even like dessert and I think it looks delicious. More shocking is the fact that I think it tastes delicious. My favourite dessert is an extra salty bag of potato chips washed down with feta cheese brine.
Although if I'm being honest over the past few years, sweet things have crossed my mind & mouth a lot more often.
This Danish Christmas Eve dessert is a good transition dish if you're thinking of venturing into the world of sweet because it's sweet but not sickeningly so. No offence to all you full time sweets people.
Also just so you know, Danes love butter and whipping cream, just as a general rule. And that is why we love the Dane's. Of course they offset all that goodness in their diet by eating pickled herring. Nobody's perfect.
Risengrød (rice pudding) has a long history of being loved in Denmark. Then in the 1800's, rich people decided that it was awfully embarrassing to be loving the same dessert that the peasants loved. At the same time they weren't willing to give up their bowls of rice pudding. I mean, who would? So the rich bougied their rice pudding up with the addition of expensive ingredients like whipping cream & almonds.
I love it.
I'm a big fan of rice pudding precisely because of the fact that it isn't too sweet. It's rich and creamy and everyone knows that all the best desserts are made with rice. Just ask my good friend Mango Sticky Rice.
Risalamande (translates to almond rice) is what's traditionally served on Christmas Eve in Danish households. Except my childhood Danish household apparently, where tradition was to pass around Creme de Menthe and ashtrays.
Making this dessert is really simple. You cook some basic rice pudding, stir in some almonds and whipped cream then top it with cherry sauce.
Table of Contents
Ingredients
- white rice (long grain or arborio)
- whole milk
- sugar
- salt
- almonds (chopped, blanched)
- 1 almond (whole)
- whipping cream
- vanilla
- Cherry Sauce
- frozen cherries
- sugar (or to taste)
- water
- cornstarch
- water
See recipe card for quantities.
Instructions
You're just going to make rice pudding and mix in whipped cream really, then a quick cherry sauce and you're done.
Make the rice pudding. When it's finished cooking you can stir in the almonds. Now start whipping the cream.
Fold the whipped cream into the rice pudding. Also - don't forget to add one whole almond.
Cook or warm up the cherry sauce.
Spoon the warm sauce over the rice pudding and serve.
The one extra special thing about Risalamande are the almonds. And not just the almonds, but the one, single whole almond that gets added to it.
The tradition is to serve all of the rice pudding and whoever gets the whole almond wins a prize. If you're the one who finds the almond you're supposed to tuck it in your cheek or hide it so no one knows it's been found.
That way everyone is forced to eat all the rice pudding in the entire house thinking the almond might still be available to be found.
Leftover rice pudding is a sin worse than carpeted bathrooms in a Danish household.
You can go as complicated or as easy as you want with the cherry sauce. I made my own out of frozen cherries, sugar and water but if you like things easy and just want to dump a can of cherry pie filling on top, feel free.
Just don't expect it to look like this if you do. Cherry pie filling will be a bit gloppy, although if you heated it up it will become runnier.
Risalamande - Danish Rice Pudding
Risalamande - Danish Rice Pudding
Ingredients
Rice Pudding
- 1 cup white rice (long grain or arborio)
- 6 cups whole milk
- ¼ cup sugar
- 1 pinch salt
- 1 cup almonds (chopped, blanched)
- 1 almond (whole)
Whipped Cream
- 1.5 cups whipping cream
- 2 tablespoon sugar
- 1 bean vanilla
Cherry Sauce
- 16 oz cherries (frozen)
- 3 tablespoon sugar (or to taste)
- ¼ cup water
- 1 tablespoon cornstarch
- 1 tablespoon water
Instructions
Rice Pudding
- Add rice, milk, sugar and a pinch of salt to pot and heat until small bubbles start to form around edge of pot. Stir occasionally.
- Once bubbles form, cover pot with lid and simmer for apx 1 hour until rice is soft.
- Remove from heat and add in chopped almonds and 1 whole almond. Allow to cool.
Whipped Cream
- Whip 1.5 cups of whipping cream. Once it starts to thicken, add the sugar.
- Once whipped, gently stir in the seeds from one whole vanilla bean.
Cherry Sauce
- Mix together 1 tablespoon of cornstarch and 1 tablespoon of water to form a slurry.
- Simmer cherries, ¼ cup of water and 3 tablespoons of sugar in a pot until the cherries are softened.
- Once softened and warm, add the slurry to the pot of cherries and bring to a slight boil. Simmer until thickened. Remove from heat.
Putting it all together
- Gently fold the whipped cream into the rice pudding. Serve in bowls or cups, topped with the warm cherry sauce.
Notes
Don't be alarmed at all the steps. It's not hard to make, but there are 3 components: the rice pudding, the whipped cream and the cherry sauce.
It even looks Christmassy which guests will appreciate, because not to appreciate something that looks like this - would be lunacy.
Of special interest to anyone who is dieting, this dessert contains no calories at all provided you just look at it.
I always thought we hid money in the plum pudding just to get everyone to eat it. Initially just stuck inside it, then wrapped (someone must have decided it was more sanitary) and tucked under it. It was a dessert no one had room for, so stuffed full of everything else we gorged ourselves on, and this was a way to ensure it didn't get left over. Ultimately we just picked out the money and left the pudding on the plate.
Love pickled herring.
ACK! Pickled herring. ~ karen!
Norske Risengrot is made with short grain rice, served with a bit of heavy cream (not whipped) stirred in and with cinnamon and sugar on top. Eaten just before the children troop out to the barn to feed the horses their Christmas Eve prize of carrots.
Risalamande has been a tradition in our home for as long as I can remember.
We start on Little Christmas Eve (the night before Christmas Eve) by having hot rice pudding - without the almonds and whipped cream - we top it with a pat of butter and sprinkle it with a cinnamon and sugar. Then on Christmas Eve we have the Risalamande and cherry sauce. I keep eating until the bowl (the big serving bowl - not just my bowl) is empty, no matter if the whole almond has been found or not. I love this stuff.
We also, traditionally, gave out a marzipan pig as the prize. We now give out a chocolate Santa, although I really prefer the marzipan pig.
Yum!!!! I'll finally be busting open that can-o-cherries that has been waiting patiently in my cupboard. Looking forward to Christmas even more now. Thanks for the recipe!
You're welcome Agnes!! ~ karen
omg I snorted! "tradition was to pass around Creme de Menthe and ashtrays." Weren't the 70's great? LOL
Has anyone tried this with soy milk?
Or almond milk, or coconut milk?
We'd have to skip the cream... but I'm curious to try this.
Ps. Due to allergies, not against dairy.
Not even lactose free? Oh, what a shame to have to miss out on whipping cream?
I've used unsweetened Cashew milk with success.
If you have a favourite that you're able to whip ??? That'd be the route to go. I'd try coconut milk or coconut cream. Good luck. ~ karen!
I think that traditions are wonderful. But do you serve this before or after the ashtrays and creme de menthe?
Both are used as palate cleansers in between servings! ~ karen
In Sweden we call it Ris a’ la Malta, (rice from Malta) don’t know how it got that name but there it is. We top it with an orange sauce or chop up fresh oranges and mix in. Sooo good! The problem I’m having in the US is finding the rice that’s suitable for making rice pudding, should be rounder and thicker. Is the Arborio in your recipe rounder?
Thanks for your inspiring and funny posts!
Hi Victoria. Yes Arborio is rounder and thicker. It's the same rice you would use for risotto. ~ karen!
So RICE IS IMPORTANT, though, right? Because, like, I live in SoCal and rice is basically illegal here. I’m not seeing this with anything less than rainbow quinoa. Also, what are cherries? Are they like goji berries, but hydrated? Help
Cherries are nothing like goji berries. As a substitute I'd probably go with a Tootsie Pop. ~ karen!
The creme de menthe and ashtrays comment leveled me! 🤣😂🤣
Danish/Norwegian here. This was a tradition in our family too, when we were growing up. There was no cherry sauce- in our family the adults drizzled a cherry liqueur over it called Cherry Heering (like a kirsch). We kids got a splash of the juice from the maraschino cherry jar. The finder of the almond won a marzipan pig (if you consider that winning). I've begun the tradition again and can't give that pig away even with a $20 under it!
LOL! Try a pig made out of iPads. That might create some excitement. ;) ~ karen!
Yum! I will have to try this. My husband and I are parts of various Scandinavian countries, plus a few others too. :)
Thinking how good those cherries would be with a splash of Kirsch...mmm. My Grammie (Hungarian) always made a baked rice pudding that you sliced and ate warm with some milk over it. We also had what we called "cinnamon rice", made with left over rice, an egg & milk with vanilla & cinnamon. Ate that alot for breakfast - satisfying filling comfort food for us, made some for my daughter the other day when she was over, and she said it just feels like home.
As a Swede, we spent Chrisrmas Eve with our compatriot immigrant families, so lutefisk ---the real kind, not the Norwegian method -- was the primary main course, with boiled potatoes. Yes the warm rice pudding, with the almond trick, as well. This dessert likely got short shrift as we all had to trek out to the Swedish Lutheran Church (ah, what a glorious beauty still in Chicago) for the Midnight service. I never liked it as being too mushy, but the better dessert was the baked rice pudding for dessert on real Christmas Day, still a favorite in the family. But recalling the almond, my job was to soak the almonds in hot water to release them from the skin, and added them to the raisin spice mix served in the hot glogg as the aftermath to the Swedish meatballs and ham. I can still catch the aroma of the glogg heating and drinking it after the meal of meatballs, on Christmas Day.
Frikadeller meatballs? Or tiny Swedish meatballs? I guess ... being that you're Swedish it would be Swedish meatballs now that I think about it, lol. ~ karen!
I love Danish rice pudding! I've made it for our family feast for the past 10 years. My version (from a Swedish cookbook 'Vinterns Goda Ting' (Winter's Good Things) has a very simple cherry sauce: heat a jar of good quality black cherry jam in a saucepan, with a table spoon or two of ruby port. So simple, and so very good.
Every August I make brandied cherries.
They are ready at Christmas.
They won't be glossy and quite as pretty as a thick cherry sauce but oh my the taste!
Sadly we have nut allergy folks who come for Christmas Eve, so no almond hunt for us. What kind of a prize?
Thanks! Definitely making this. So pretty!
I'm not the biggest fan of the taste of whipped cream so I follow my grandmother's recipe which adds 1 or 2 tablespoons of sherry into the mix. It just gives it that little something extra. To those of you who are new to the recipe: remember to remove the skin from the whole almond otherwise it's far to easy to spot and then who will have all the belly aches?
Not only do I adore rice pudding, I love how Christmasy this looks. Once the clan has left on Christmas Day and I'm alone with the beautiful twinkling lights and merry glow of family, I will eat this delicious concoction by myself and be so grateful for family, food, and friends like you. It will be the perfect way to spend my day. Dishes can wait till morning.
OMG... CREME DE MENTHE AND ASHTRAYS!!!!! Reading this made me laugh so hard that I tinkled. tmi. i know. can't help the honesty because I think we might hv grown up in the same houshold from that comment. Seriously... my face hurts from laughing now. This looks lovely and great for a simple Christmas. I can't wait to try it. Thank you for your lovely blog that lifts and inspires (and makes me tinkle😉) u r my favourite words. Witty, Irreverent, Sassy, and True. Merry Christmas.
I was just looking for a new Christmas Eve dessert....and here it is. Thanks so much. I love the cherry sauce addition. so colorful for Christmas. Being able to make it the day before is an additional plus. I had a Norwegian grandmother and she was the worst cook in the world. Boiled every thing to death.