2 14-ounce cans of coconut milk (don’t use the lite stuff)
1/2 cup water
2 cups jasmine rice, washed and drained
1 /2 t sea salt
1 head garlic, peeled and minced
1 3″ stick of ginger, peeled and cut into 1” pieces
2 t canola oil
3 stalks green onion, sliced and minced
1/2 bunch of cilantro, washed. No need to remove all the stems.
2–3 limes, zest and juice
1 cup shredded sweetened coconut (or unsweetened if you are feeling virtuous)
1 1/2 cups chopped pineapple or mango, or both
Instructions
Heat oven to 350 degrees. Put coconut milk, water, rice and salt in a covered pan. Bring just to a boil and reduce heat to low, cover and cook for 15 minutes. Watch carefully as the coconut milk boils over easily. After 15 minutes, the rice may still appear to be soupy. Give it a stir and it will absorb a lot of the moisture that is in the top of the pan. Put the cover back on and allow to rest off the heat while you finish chopping and toasting the rest of the goodies.
Spread your coconut evenly in the bottom of a baking dish. Toast for a few minutes, stirring every minute and watching carefully so it does not burn. Be warned it can burn fast. When you open the oven your eyes will be blasted with acrid heat. I don’t know why toasting coconut does this, but you will see what I mean. I recommend not getting your face too close when you first open the oven.
Next, get to chopping your ginger and garlic. Hopefully you are using a food processor. A food processor quickly take the ginger and garlic down to a fine mince. Just remember to pulse. If you are cutting by hand, chop, do not grate the ginger. Grating just turns the ginger into a stringy mess.
Saute the ginger and garlic in canola oil for 5 minutes until cooked. Stirring frequently taking care not to burn.
Chop the cilantro and green onion. You can pulse the cilantro a couple times in the food processor if you wish, but I hand chop the green onion because I like the way the green onion rings look when they are hand-chopped.