Yogurt rice with mango is a nostalgic meal for me. Usually, after dinner, the leftover rice is mixed with warm milk, a spoon of yogurt culture is added, mixed and kept covered overnight in a tiffin box. By next morning, milk would turn into yogurt and is already mixed with rice – school lunch box would be ready. My mother used to prepare yogurt rice in this way and would also add small cubes of mango for mid-day meal, during our hot summer school days.
The quote, ‘Looks can be deceiving’ applies to this one. Even though, the whole thing looks homely and common, the taste is simply unique and very satisfying. Rice soaks up milk and when milk turns into yogurt, the rice also changes. It looses its biting kind of inner resistance, turns into soft, supple kind of grain. Addition of fruit, like mango, as a topping makes it even better. The meal is not only nutritional, also follows the ayurvedic principle of balancing the food ingredients, hot ones with cold one. Mango is famous for its heat generation where as yogurt is known for its cooling properties on human body. Combination of them together, makes this, a well-balanced, simple meal/dessert kind of food.
Adding yogurt culture to warm rice-milk mixture
1 cup of cooked rice
2 cups of warm milk
¼ teaspoon of salt or to taste
Fruit Topping
I ripe mango – peeled and cut into small cubes
Mix the rice with milk. Add a tablespoon of yogurt culture and mix lightly; cover the vessel with lid and keep it in a warm area overnight. By next morning, the milk will be turned into yogurt. Stir in salt to taste. Sprinkle the mango cubes on top. With each spoon, take a small portion of yogurt rice and one cube of mango. Enjoy the sweet mango with creamy rich yogurt rice.
This is my contribution to the event “Jihvā For Mangoes”. I am very excited to host this event and thank you all for your enthusiastic participation with wonderful mango recipes. I am planning to do a recap of all the entries that I received, by tomorrow.
Wow, i cant believe i am the first person to comment. I love this food….when we go to granny’s place for summer holidays, my sisters and I used to hog on this 🙂 Memories.
Comment by Supriya — May 1, 2006 @ 6:04 am
We too, Supriya. I completely forgot about this type of preparation. When I prepared this yogurt rice yesterday, the memories came back. 🙂
Comment by Indira — May 1, 2006 @ 6:10 am
wow chinna naati aa gnapakalani bhale gurtu chesaru Indira. I love to have mango with my curd rice.Nice presentation.
Indira replies:
Thanks Tanuja.
Comment by tanuja — May 1, 2006 @ 9:16 am
Mango with yogurt rice is my mom’s favorite. My preference however, is to enjoy both of them separately 🙂 I’ve posted my entry for JFI at http://saffronhut.blogspot.com. Looking forward to the roundup 🙂
cheers!
Indira replies:
Hi SH, thanks for participating in this event.
Could please email me your entry along with photo, that would make it little bit easy for me to do the roundup. Thanks.
Comment by Saffron Hut — May 1, 2006 @ 9:31 am
Indira:
I NEVER heard of making yoghurt rice this way and NEVER ate mango with yoghurt rice! I hated yoghurt rice in my tiffin dabba growing up but on few ocasions when I did take it, it was always rice mixed in with already made yoghurt. I SHOULD defintely try it this way! Thanks for posting.
Indira replies:
This is more like what you would find in villages, LC. This type of yogurt rice is very popular there, particularly during hot summer months. They prepare it in small earthenware, acts like mini cooler also.
Comment by Luv2cook — May 1, 2006 @ 9:47 am
I have never ever heard of this combo, and so it sounds even more interesting. I am really curious to taste this, will try it out soon
Archana
Indira replies:
Popular type of picnic food-home made type, in our area, Archana. Give it a try. I am sure you are going to like it. Thanks.
Comment by Archana — May 1, 2006 @ 9:56 am
were you singing “These are a fe of my favorite things” while making this Indira? 🙂
Sent U a mail with my entry.
Indira replies:
Nope, but I was singing with mouthfuls, not a pretty sight. 🙂
Thanks.
Comment by Santhi — May 1, 2006 @ 10:06 am
Everything you make is so delicious Indira. I got so excited with the mango day and even forgot to email you my entry. Oops! I was so busy reading everyone else’s posts.
Indira replies:
After all this hungama… don’t foget to send me the entry. Will be waiting, thanks.
Comment by RP — May 1, 2006 @ 10:42 am
Indira, in my in laws house they have curd rice with ripe mango. I like this combo:) I actually forgot abt this combo now!! Nice pictures:)
Indira replies:
Me too, thanks Priya.
Comment by Priya — May 1, 2006 @ 11:19 am
Hi Indira
Congratulations !! This is my entry. Just sent u the pic url.
http://en-ulagam.blogspot.com/2006/05/jihv-for-mangoes-mango-cake.html
Cheers !!
Comment by Revathi — May 1, 2006 @ 12:10 pm
In our hostel,the skinniest of us used to take this rice. Someone told us, it is going to make us all fat. And we ate the curd rice with mango pickle every single day. But none of us put more than a kilo.
I think all that “try-to-become-fatter” works only now and that too even if i skip three meals 🙂
Comment by L.G — May 1, 2006 @ 2:11 pm
Indira: MY favorite too. In my home, almost every night, there used to be a fruit after or during the dinner (depends), when-in mango season, this is the deadly combination which we all love.. thanks for those forgetten nostalgic meals 🙂
Here is my link to JFI,http://kitchenmate.blogspot.com/2006/05/mango-thokku-grated-mango-pickle.html#links
i am going to send an email with the 75×75 pixel sized photo.. well it looks too small Indira 😉
Comment by Karthi Kannan — May 1, 2006 @ 2:49 pm
You know, I wasn’t going to submit anything to the Jihva for mangoes since the mangoes in Italy aren’t worth eating but, Indira, you inspired me! Your recipe looks so intriguing, and soooo similar to a Thai dessert called Mamuang Kao that I just love! It’s mangoes with coconut sticky rice, so here’s the entry: http://porcinichronicles.blogspot.com/2006/04/mamuang-kao-mangoes-and-coconut-sticky.html
Indira replies:
Hi Susan, thanks for your interest in this event. I’d greatly appreciate if you could send me via email, your entry along with photo. That will make it little bit easy for me to do my recap. Thanks!
Comment by Susan in Italy — May 1, 2006 @ 4:20 pm
I, too, have never ever heard of this combination. You know, Indira, I feel that Indian cuisine is so diverse that you could have a thousand blogs around, and would still bump into totally new things every now and then. This is why I find it so difficult when Germans ask me the question:’What is Indian food all about?’ I normally tell them that I am myself trying to figure it out, and I don’t even have to lie. I also tell them that cooking in India is less of a chore and more of a passion. And it’s been like that for centuries. Oh, I could go on about this. Anyway, thanks for the post and thanks for event.
Comment by Vaishali — May 1, 2006 @ 4:20 pm
yummm….your dish looks yummy…must try this combination. I was going through my list of blogs on favorite and I was pleasantly surprised to see every single of them had a mango entry…I am so happy your first event has turned out so popular…congratulations!!!
Comment by Nabeela — May 1, 2006 @ 4:37 pm
One my favorite summer meals, brings back good ol’ memories.
Comment by Arjuna — May 1, 2006 @ 4:49 pm
What a unique combination. I knew JFI would be a learning experience from all the entries but even I wasnt prepared for this. Every blog I visit seems to have something new and unique to do with mangoes. Great work Indira…
Comment by Ashwini — May 1, 2006 @ 4:51 pm
Hi Indira,
Good Idea to mix curd rice with mango, I usually season the curd rice & mix cut pieces of grapes, kids love to eat that.Iam going try this out, simply adding mangoes with out seasoning.Nice pictures!
Madhavi.
Comment by Madhavi — May 1, 2006 @ 5:26 pm
Makes me very nostalgic, especially seeing Curd rice in a steel box 🙂
Comment by veda — May 1, 2006 @ 5:29 pm
Hi Indira,
I always appreciate traditonal recipes, your yogurt rice makes me understand a bit more about ingredients and people wisdom on how to use them.
I enjoy your blog a lot! And thank you for hosting JFI, and look forward to seeing more wonderful stories and recipes.
Comment by gattina — May 1, 2006 @ 7:12 pm
So many recipes and so little time . I am thinking of starting a blog just to participate in this event:-) This is my mom’s favorite combo. Keep up the good work, Indira.
Comment by Krithika Ramachandran — May 1, 2006 @ 7:14 pm
Hey Indira,
Guess thats a true blue Andhra tradition- because I’ve never heard of this combo- Its sounds so simple and sweet to pass, will probably try it tonight itself and have it as a kind-of fruit-cereal for breakfast tomorrow !
Cheers to you for starting the mango madness among food-blogs the world over
haha
Comment by nandita — May 2, 2006 @ 12:47 am
Indira, Is this raw rice. Looking at your pics, it looks like raw rice? We used to use cooked rice?
Indira replies:
Hi LG, This is cooked Sona Masuri rice. The grain looks slender and slim but has lot of integrity, won’t turn into mush that easily. 🙂 Hence the individual grain kind of appearance, even though it was cooked and soaked in milk overnight after adding the yogurt culture.
Comment by L.G — May 2, 2006 @ 8:02 am
That looks really good and I wanted to try it.
Is the overall taste a yogurty one with some sweet from the mango? I was wondering if I could add some sugar and make the whole thing slightly sweet.
Indira replies:
The example, I can think of is like leftover sambhar or dal rice. That good, again this appeals to people who like plain, just regular kind of yogurt mixed with rice.
I’ve never tried or tasted with sugar, but you can try it, prepare it in two separate boxes, one with sugar and one without – in small quantities to findout which one you prefer. Mango and small sweet grapes, these are the two fruits that we usually add as topping to this type of yogurt rice.
If you try let me know how you like it, Gini. Thanks.
Comment by Gini — May 3, 2006 @ 10:03 am
Tried this yest and it was yummy. A very satisfying meal. Made yoghurt rice my way but added mango at the end. Thanks for sharing this wonderful yet simple recipe.
Comment by Kerala Girl — May 19, 2006 @ 12:18 pm
Dear Indira,
As part of my weekly Recipe Carousel (this week’s theme is yoghurt) I have included a link and photo of your recipe for yoghurt rice with mango
http://morselsandmusings.blogspot.com/2006/09/recipe-carousel-15-yoghurt.html
I hope this is OK with you, but if it’s a problem please let me know.
All the best,
Anna
Comment by Anna — September 24, 2006 @ 7:53 pm
i came upon your site through “morsels and musings” and have been enjoying your posts.
i enjoy mango with sweet sticky rice, and your yoghurt rice with mango looks great.
best,
blue plate
Comment by blue plate — September 26, 2006 @ 6:47 pm
Indira,
I am a big fan of your website, but first time writing a comment. This dish absolutely took me back to the days of pre-teen at home. My dad would make curd rice, basically hand mash cooked rice very well and add thick home made curds to this. He would also hand puree ripe mangoes into the curd rice, add a little salt and then feed two very hungry and eager mouths me and my sis. After we grew a little older, we would still hanker him for this meal and he would oblige us and him being a very creative and artistic person, he would ask us to cup our hands, put some of the yellow rice in it and top it off with the water of midi pickle(the one that has tiny mangoes in it) AAAAAAAAAAh heaven! Your post has taken me back to those blissful days! Sigh!
God bless you and may you write many many many more such articles and help all of us readers learn new things and also relive the past 🙂
Regards,
Lakshmi
Comment by Lakshmi — October 10, 2007 @ 1:28 pm
Indira,
Your recipe looks so yummy that I tried it the very next day. But nextday morning, it became very thick. I added buttermilk to it next day to loosen it up little bit. I opened it after 8 hrs. I am not sure where i went wrong. Please let me know. Actually i made this for our satsangh and every one said it is very nice and reminded them of their grand mother’s recipe.
Comment by Kanthi — January 31, 2008 @ 8:14 am