Gluten Free Homemade Horchata Take Two

This is a follow up to my original Horchata recipe. Here I’ve improved the process and the volume produced. Thanks to my friend Elaine who orally riffed on this recipe with me and discussed tweaks. Her counsel gave me the right experimental mindset for these improvements.

Ingredients

• 2 2/3 cups uncooked white long-grain rice
• 3 whole cinnamon sticks
• 10 cups water
• 2 1/2 cup milk (I used 2%)
• 2 tbsp vanilla
• 1 2/3 cup granulated sugar (I’m going to try a low cal sweetener soon but haven’t yet)

Steps

1. Combine the rice, cinnamon sticks in a blender. Blend until the rice and cinnamon sticks are roughly ground up (2 minutes). Pour this into a nut milk strainer bag. Place the bag in a large pitcher and add all the water.
2. Let the rice mixture soak at room temperature at least 8 hours, or overnight.
3. Once the rice mixture has soaked for at least 8 hours, remove the bag and squeeze it to get all the juice out.
4. Stir in the milk, vanilla, and sugar, then chill ready to serve. Serve over plenty of ice