Peanut Sticky Rice (Xoi lac) for Breakfast

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For any Vietnamese people, who is living in a foreign country like me, I guess we all miss all the dishes that we have for breakfast the most. In Vietnam, it seems like so easy to buy something for breakfast. Fast, fresh, easy but yummy! There are so many dishes you can rotate to have for breakfast so that you would never get bored, such as tons of kind of noodles (yes, not only Pho), tons of kind of sticky rice (Xoi) (you can have sweet sticky rice (xoi ngot) or savory sticky rice (xoi man)), tons of kind of cakes or dumpling etc. Wow, I guess I cannot list all out.

Last week, I saw a Vietnamese movie talking about life of university students who leave their hometown and stay in a big city to study. Gosh, I could relate to that and felt it very well ‘cause now I’m also a far-away home student. There is a scene that reminded me of the breakfast in Vietnam. Though I was in the bed already, but it made me get out and soak the glutinous rice into the water to prepare this dish for my breakfast the next day lol. Guess what, I’ve found a very quick way to cook sticky rice (xoi) in microwave. It takes about 10 minutes or so only to have a very delicious breakfast. This time I would like to introduce to you Xoi Lac (Peanut sticky rice). “Lac” means peanut and “xoi” means sticky rice. Here is how I make it in just 10 minutes.

1. Ingredients:

• 1 cup glutinous rice (sweet rice)
• 1/3 cup raw peanut (if you don’t want to have peanut, just leave it out then you’ll have a basic white sticky rice (xoi trang))
• A pinch of salt
• 1 tablespoon of cooking oil
• Tools: microwave cooker (Mine is not exactly the same)

2. Instructions:

• Clean and soak the glutinous rice and the peanut in cold water in 6 – 8 hours (I usually soak them overnight). You can soak them separately or together. I prefer to soak them together so that the color from the skin of peanut is kind of making the color of rice nicer). So all you have to do is soaking the rice and peanut before going to bed, and tomorrow morning you will cook in a microwave for about 10 mins before you have a very yummy breakfast.

• When I wake up the next morning, before doing anything else, I put the glutinous rice and peanut into my pot that is specialized to use in microwave, then pour in cold water just to cover up the rice and peanut a little bit (like in the below photo), a pinch of salt and cooking oil. Put the pot in the microwave for 6 minutes.

• After 6 minutes, check it out. The sticky rice (xoi lac) should be nearly done. At this stage, if you see there is still a lot of water, scoop the water out by a spoon. Put the pot back to microwave for about 3 more minutes, and then xoi lac (peanut sticky rice) is done.

Simple enough but it works for me, so I can wake up not to early but still be able to have my favorite breakfast. Xoi lac (peanut sticky rice) is delicious as it is or you can have it with muoi lac (kind of roasted peanuts processed with salt). Some people also want have with some meat, they can have xoi lac with Vietnamese ham (gio or cha lua) or whatever works for you.

Well, after writing this post, I’d better go to soak the glutinous rice and peanuts in to water to make Xoi lac for tomorrow breakfast ^^

Have a nice weekend, everyone!