to ask do people not make milk puddings anymore?

[5foot5]

I found a recipe I wanted to make Mincemeat and Shortbread squares. One of the ingredients is ground rice. Fine, but I knew I didn't have any so I added it to the shopping list.

DH did the shopping and came back saying he couldn't find it anywhere. Hmm. I went to look for myself. Admittedly it is not something I can remember having bought myself but I know it was a staple my mum always had in the cupboard for baking and making puddings with.

It will be where they keep the semolina I thought. I remembered all those weekday milk puddings my mum made - rice, ground rice, semolina, tapioca, sago. Find the ingredients for those and that is where the ground rice will be I thought.

Except they don't seem to exist anymore. I checked all the supermarkets in town and the wholefood store. No luck. Is this a whole species of pudding people just don't do anymore? Anyone know where I could get ground rice?

If you are still there and are at all interested I substituted ground almonds on the basis that:
a. It has "ground" in the name
b. I think my mum used ground rice sometimes as an economical substitute for ground almonds in recipes like maids of honour so maybe it will work out ok in reverse.

I made rice pudding just last week. It's my boys' favourite. Never used ground rice for anything though.

My grandad used to put a rice pudding in the oven to cook at the same time as his hot pot. Cheap, nutritious food.

My mum is the best cook but I am nostalgic for her semolina. Dad died v recently and was a massive fan of school dinner puddings. I hate rice pudding etc but semolina, does it still exist?

Oh I haven't tried Morrison's. No access to a Waitrose or Asda. Damned if I could find it even in our big Tesco but that link Blondie posted looked like the real thing.

Ground rice is different to pudding rice but you can make a pudding with it.

I actually really fancy a rice pudding now, but one made with pudding rice not ground rice which was always a poor substitute IMO.

I think the real value of ground rice was as an economical substitute for ground almonds

If you have a food processor perhaps you could blitz rice to make ground rice.

I could really go for bowl of semolina with a dollop of jam now.

You need ground rice to make decent short bread. It makes the texture just right. Yy to whizzing some white rice in a blender.

Ground rice goes into shortbread. Makes it lighter. That's from decades ago. I have some in my cupboard so they must sell it somewhere,

Ah, milk puddings served with a big dollop of jam in the middle. The school dinners of yesteryear.

Never could stand tapioca though. We called it 'frog spawn'.

Morrison's online has proper ground rice.

That was weird Liz!

If you ask the right person in Tesco (a team leader at checkouts)they have a app they can search and tell you exactly where it is if they have it

I have a little bit of a weakness for rice pudding as it was an absolute taboo in our house because my mother hated it. She had been forced to eat it as a child (literally, banished to a corner with a bowl of the stuff and not allowed to move until she'd eaten it all).

Ah, so rice pudding was your mother's filboid studge then, RSGB.

I've just bought an icecream maker, and tried just putting in sweetened milk. Very basic milk ice-cream - really nice.

Semolina? Was that the bubble one? Made with carnation milk?

I have honestly never heard of a pudding made with ground rice... As someone upthread said you can put it in shortbread.

I made a rice pudding a couple of weeks ago, but the skin was rubbish. Anyone know how to get a thick caramelly skin on a rice pud?

Is couscous not basically semolina?

I loved all those puddings as a child. I still do now, but don't make them as dh refuses them (his mum was a dreadful cook and succeeded in putting him off most food), he won't believe that they can be nice if you make them properly.

" Was that the bubble one? Made with carnation milk?"

I think that's tapioca, as in seed pearls, also used in bubble tea? Semolina is the one that had that mealy texture, I think.

Halfwitpicker: I’m taking a bit of a guess here but I think that to get the thick skin, you would need to use whole milk (not skimmed or semi-skimmed)?

Tapioca is what they use in bubble tea

Sago pudding is also similar. We used to call it frogspawn!

Half. My rice pudding was in a low oven for about 3 hours. It had a caramelly skin. Personally I'm not so keen on the skin.

Actually I’ve just looked up rice pudding and there is an article with the title “How To Make Perfect Rice Pudding” from the Guardian newspaper online,Thursday 18 Nov, 2010.

It has a discussion on various ways of cooking it (ie on the hob or baked in the oven.....it doesn’t mention slow cookers). I tend to personally use Delia Smith’s recipes tbh, they always work!

Sago pudding! That's it. Is that tapioca?

Thank you, crazy and twinkly.

I use a River Cottage recipe: it's better pudding than my mum's which is a bit watery. My mum also uses condensed milk. While I love condensed milk there's no need. My rice pudding is rice, milk, butter and sugar. I also use lactofree stuff so lactose intolerant DS can enjoy some milky yummyness.

Tinkly!

Sorry.