A creamy stovetop rice pudding served with Scottish whisky, honey, and fresh raspberries! This easy rice pudding recipe is a luxurious dessert made with arborio rice, warmed milk, vanilla, orange, and cosy spices. Including dairy-free options, plus an apple pie flavour variation. Enjoy this ultimate comfort food warm or chilled, inspired by the rice pudding from Stardew Valley.
This luxurious creamy rice pudding takes the traditional classic to a whole new level of tastiness. It’s one of my favourite cosy comfort foods to make any time the weather takes a turn for a darker stormy day. I enjoy having this recipe year round though – chilled in the summer, or warm during autumn or winter.
Of course, like many of my comfort foods, it features some of my favourite ingredients – Scottish whisky, fresh raspberries, honey, vanilla, orange, and warm spices. It’s an absolutely delicious dish, I can’t get enough of it.
It’s also a very easy recipe to make dairy-free, I’ve included my dairy-free fixes in the recipe below (it’s been mom-tested and approved, by the way).
I also included a half-size recipe – in case you only want two servings instead of four (I would literally eat all four portions, that’s my problem!).
How To Cook Stovetop Rice Pudding? Like Risotto!
This recipe, in the simplest sense, is actually a dessert-style Italian risotto. If you ever cooked risotto, the instructions for this recipe will look familiar.
Risotto is made with arborio rice, and the rice must be in motion while it cooks. The constant agitation of the rice with a cooking spoon while slowly adding liquid (warmed milk in this case) is what causes the rice to gradually release its starches and get that signature creaminess.
Make sure that you do use warmed milk for this dessert risotto, or this process won’t result in the tastiest rice pudding – the milk must be warm so it can be absorbed by the rice.
Check out my savoury risotto recipes here!
What Type of Whisky To Use?
I recommend choosing a Scottish highland whisky for this rice pudding recipe. Highland whiskies are exported pretty far and wide on an international scale.
I generally use Oban, Glenmorangie or Drambuie for this recipe. Drambuie is actually a liqueur made from whisky and Scottish heather honey (it’s my favourite).
If you’re looking for other recipes using whisky, or of Scottish ilk, check out my family recipes for Scottish shortbread, cranachan, and haggis in pastry crust.
Fresh or Ground Spices?
You can use either! I opted to use whole cinnamon sticks, a star anise pod, ground cardamom and ground nutmeg because that’s what I have on hand.
If you use whole spices (not ground), add them to the milk before heating it up. You can either remove the whole spice pieces before adding the milk to the rice, or pick them out of the rice just before serving (for a more intense flavour).
If using ground spices, add them to the rice pudding when you start incorporating the warm milk.
What Vanilla To Use? Paste, Extract or Pods?
You can use vanilla bean paste, vanilla extract or real vanilla beans for this recipe. Depending on your choice of product, you add these components at different steps during the custard making process.
- Vanilla bean paste or extract is added to the rice pudding at the very end, along with the honey, whisky and butter.
- By contrast, a real vanilla bean must be added to the milk before heating, then allowed to steep in the hot milk before adding to the pudding.
Using Real Vanilla Beans
Split the vanilla bean lengthwise and scrape out the seeds using a knife. Using the flat side of the knife or the very tip of the knife usually is the most efficient part for scraping the seeds out of the vanilla bean pod.
Add the vanilla bean seeds and the vanilla bean pod to the saucepan with the milk. Heat the mixture over medium-high heat while stirring, until it’s just about to simmer.
Steep the hot milk with the vanilla bean pod components for at least 10 minutes. If using a real vanilla bean, it will need to steep before you can temper the egg mixture with the hot milk.
Simply remove the hot milk (already containing the vanilla bean pod and insides) from heat. Cover it tightly with a lid, then let it steep for 10 minutes.
Rice Pudding in Stardew Valley
You can make rice pudding in Stardew Valley using a cookout kit or in the farmhouse kitchen. Simply combine rice, milk, and sugar.
This recipe can be obtained from Evelyn. She will share it with you once you have seven hearts with her. So – keep a bunch of beets and tulips on hand to give her as gifts!
Rice Pudding in Stardew Valley: Rice + Milk + Sugar
It’s also possible to buy rice pudding from the Stardrop Saloon or Krobus’s shop on Saturdays… if you’re lucky and they happen to have it in stock.
If you ever wanted to learn the secret to Demetrius’s heart, this is the way! He loves rice pudding. Most of the villagers just like it, although (of course) a few people have to hate it too. A surprising number of villagers dislike rice pudding – Emily, Leo, Krobus, Willy, Leah and Harvey.
You can also combine rice pudding with some cloth on Emily’s sewing machine to make a light blue shirt with a stripe on it. No idea why it’s blue – in the tiny picture the shirt honestly looks green, but maybe my eye sight is just suffering.
Also, on a last weird note. If you are keen on keeping a pond full of blobfish, they may request rice pudding from you in order to increase their fish numbers. Why they like rice pudding, who will ever know!
Rice Pudding with Whisky and Raspberries
This Scottish-inspired stovetop rice pudding recipe makes 4 servings and is ready to eat in 1 hour (excluding chill time, if desired).
Note: For a half-size recipe that makes 2 servings, click here.
Ingredients
- 1 litre | 4 cups milk or heavy cream (or coconut, oat, or soy milk)
- 250 ml | 1 cup filtered water
- 220g | 1 cup arborio rice, unwashed
- 20g | 2 tbsp orange zest
- 120ml | ½ cup orange juice
- 6g | 2 tsp ground cinnamon (or 2 cinnamon sticks)
- 1 g | ½ tsp ground cardamom (or 2-4 whole cardamom pods)
- 1 g | ½ tsp ground nutmeg
- 2 star anise pods
- 1 g | ¼ tsp salt
- 15 ml | 1 tbsp vanilla bean paste or extract (or 3 vanilla bean pods)
- 125 ml | ½ cup honey (or 100 g sugar – brown or white)
- 60 g | ¼ cup butter (or coconut oil)
- 2 oz | 60ml | ¼ cup Scottish whisky (eg. Oban or Drambuie) – Omit this if you need to for your intended audience!
- 4-6 oz | 1 – 1 ½ cups fresh raspberries
Tools
- large frying pan
- medium saucepan
- large measuring cup (or other heat-safe vessel that is easy to pour liquid from)
- zester
- knife
- cutting board
- citrus juicer
- cooking spoon
- measuring cups
- measuring spoons
- optional: shot glass
Instructions
- Soak the fresh raspberries in cool water for 5 minutes, then rinse thoroughly and pat dry. Pick out any damaged or decayed raspberries, then set the clean berries aside.
- Prepare the ingredients. Measure out the spices, whisky, honey, butter, rice, milk, etc, then set aside. Zest and juice the orange, then set aside.
Note: If using fresh vanilla beans, slice the pods open lengthwise and scrape out the seed paste inside (save both the seed paste and the pods to add to the warm milk).
- Heat the milk in a medium saucepan over medium-high heat. Stirring constantly. If using fresh spices or scraped out vanilla bean pods, add them to the milk as well. Let the milk heat until it just barely breaks into a simmer, then remove the milk from the heat and cover with a lid. Let the warm milk sit covered for at least 10 minutes before adding it to the rice.
- Add the water to a large frying pan. Warm the water over high heat until it breaks into a simmer.
- Reduce the heat to medium and add the rice. Stir the rice until the water is fully absorbed.
- Add the orange zest and juice. Stir the rice until the juice is fully absorbed.
- Add the spices and salt (if using ground spices). Mix well.
- Add the warm milk, a little bit at a time (remove the whole spice pieces first, or add them into the rice and pick them out later). Stir the rice continuously, allowing the rice to absorb all the milk before adding the next splash of milk. Repeat this process for 20 minutes, until the rice is fully cooked and all the milk has been added.
- Turn off the heat but leave the pan over the burner. Add the honey, vanilla extract, whisky, and butter, then stir the pudding over the residual burner heat for 2-3 minutes.
- Serve the rice pudding warm or chilled, topped with fresh raspberries and a drizzle of honey.
Note: If serving the rice pudding chilled, lay some plastic wrap directly against the surface of the rice pudding while it cools, to prevent a skin from forming on the top.
Chill the covered pudding in the fridge for at least 2 hours before serving.
Don’t add the raspberries until just before serving.
Rice Pudding: Half-Size Recipe (2 servings)
Maybe you’re only wanting to make 2 servings of this rice pudding (or just smaller servings in general). Here is the half-size version of this recipe, to make things a little easier.
Instructions and tools are the same as for the full size recipe above.
Ingredients
- 500 ml | 2 cups milk or heavy cream (or coconut, oat, or soy milk)
- 125 ml | ½ cup filtered water
- 110g | ½ cup arborio rice, unwashed
- 10g | 1 tbsp orange zest
- 60ml | ¼ cup orange juice
- 3 g | 1 tsp ground cinnamon (or 1 cinnamon stick)
- 0.5 g | ¼ tsp ground cardamom (or 1-2 whole cardamom pods)
- 0.5 g | ¼ tsp ground nutmeg
- 1 star anise pod
- pinch of salt
- 10 ml | 2 tsp vanilla bean paste or extract (or 2 vanilla bean pods)
- 60 ml | ¼ cup honey (or 50 g sugar – brown or white)
- 30 g | 2 tbsp butter (or coconut oil)
- 1 oz | 30ml | 2 tbsp Scottish whisky (eg. Oban or Drambuie) – Omit this if you need to for your intended audience!
- 2-4 oz | ½ -1 cup fresh raspberries
The Cosiest Rice Pudding
This stove top rice pudding is so creamy, it really is the ultimate comfort food for me. Plus you can always add variation in flavour to this dessert dish depending on the types of spices, berries, and citrus fruits you choose to use.
Here are a few different flavour swap ideas:
- Swap the orange for lemon. This is my mother’s preference.
- Swap the milk for heavy cream for a more luxurious experience.
- To make it dairy-free, use coconut or soy milk, and swap the butter with coconut oil.
- Use stewed apples or buttered apples in place of raspberries for an “apple pie” rice pudding flavour. You could even use caramelized apples!
Also, you can totally skip adding the whisky to this recipe if you need to for certain audiences, or use a different liquor entirely. I think Limoncello would also be brilliant in this.
So, did you make this rice pudding with whisky and raspberries? Let me know!
Simmering Starfruit 
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