Mushroom Congee (jook)
I was never a huge huge fan of jook when I was young, but it is another dish that has grown on me over the years. This recipe is more of a vegan version as we used to cook it with pork bones and it was a bit strong in flavour for me. I also love adding all the extras on top to make it more interesting. Although it takes some time, it is pretty simple to make and you can keep it for days and reheat as you need or want!
Ingredients
- SEE BELOW TO PURCHASE PRODUCTS
- 1 cup jasmine rice
- 6 dried shiitake mushrooms
- 4 cups water 2 x 2 cups required
- 5 cups stock vegetable if making vegan or chicken
- 2-3 stalks lemongrass
- 4 cm piece of ginger peeled and sliced
- 2 cloves garlic smashed
- 1 tsp salt
Toppings
- soy sauce
- chilli oil
- ground white pepper
- fried onions
- sliced green onions
- cubes of tofu either fresh or fried
Instructions
- Rinse the rice just once (need to keep some of the starch in the jook) and drain.
- Boil two of the cups of water and pour into bowl with rice.
- Rinse the shiitake mushrooms and add them to the bowl with the hot water and soak for 45 mins.
- After 45 minutes add the rice to a large pot with the mushrooms (including the water) and add remaining 2 cups of water, stock, lemongrass, ginger, garlic, salt. Cover the pot with a lid and bring to the boil.
- Once it is boiling, reduce the heat to low and let the congee simmer for about an hour. Keep an eye on it as you don't want it to boil over.
- After about an hour, take a look at your congee - it probably will still look too watery and the rice will still look quite grainy but that's ok. Give it a stir and turn off the heat. Put the lid ajar and let congee cool. It will start to thicken.
- If it hasn't thickened and it is still watery, turn the heat back on low for maybe another 10-15 minutes.
- Remove the mushrooms, lemongrass, ginger, garlic from the pot. I wait until the mushrooms are a bit cool and then slice them up to add as a topping. if you don't like dried mushrooms, you can always lightly fry some fresh shiitake or any mushrooms to add as a topping.
