Mexican Horchata

I got my wisdom teeth taken out on Friday, not especially the most pleasant experience in the world so I will spare you the gruesome details. Whats worse, Daniel had to leave for Columbus, Ohio on a work trip about an hour after he drove me home from the oral surgeon.

So here I am, cooped up on a Saturday with no place to go, and no one to share my misery because half of my face looks like a chipmunk and I keep getting headaches. Thankfully a friend is coming over later to veg around and watch movies with me.

I have to admit, I am getting squeamishly tired of eating mashed potatoes, apple sauce and ginger ale. I had the idea to make Mexican Horchata when I realized I basically had all the ingredients at home. I had to improvise a bit as I did not have white rice, fresh lime or cinnamon sticks. I also did not want to refrigerate the almond and rice mixture overnight as I wanted to consume it today, so technically this is my own recipe adapted from Gourmet Sleuth.

For those of you who don't know, horchata is a sweet milky-like drink made out of rice, almonds, lime, and cinnamon. It does not have any milk in it, so it is definitely vegan. Oh, and its supposed to be a good cure for a hangover.

INGREDIENTS:
6 Tbs. cooked brown rice
1 1/4 cup toasted almond slivers
3 tsp. ground cinnamon
4 tsp. lime juice (fresh is best)
1 cup white sugar
6 cups water

DIRECTIONS:
Using a food processor, pulverize the almonds and rice together until it as smooth as possible. Transfer the mixture into a blender and add the cinnamon, lime and 2 cups of water. Blend for 2 minutes.



Transfer the liquid into a large mixing bowl. Stir in 4 cups of water and the sugar. You may want to use more or less sugar depending on your preference.

Using a wire mesh strainer, strain the liquid 4 or 5 times until it runs smoothly through the strainer. Pour liquid into a pitcher and refrigerate about 3 hours, or until very cold.

Makes 6-7 servings

P.S. As a kid, I used to heat up left over rice in the microwave with milk, brown sugar, cinnamon and butter. I am thinking it might be good to eat the left over rice you made for this recipe that way, by just heating up the rice with some horchata poured over like its cereal. Sounds good to me, but I will probably have to wait until my mouth heals a bit more.