recipe – Ash's blog

I’ve been loving my rice cooker. Between that and the air fryer it makes it super easy to prepare work-from-home lunches without having to do much of anything at all.

It’s a little Cuckoo 6-cup pressure rice cooker, which is the perfect size for me. And, look, probably the perfect size for anyone unless you have a massive family. I don’t know why rice cookers are always so enormous.

I’ll usually throw in a bit of seasoning, some msg, assorted herbs, bit of chilli depending on my mood, then put some marinated chicken in the air fryer, pop some some steamed veg on, and voila! It’s a low effort meal, and I can keep working at my desk while it cooks. It’s healthy and tasty, and one of my go-to CBF food strategies.

But today I was feeling a bit of a malaise. I didn’t just want rice and chicken, I wanted something more. Something extravagent. Something with a bit of fat to it, actually.

So when the rice cooker finished I had the genius idea to grate a bit of cheese into it, and stir it through. With a bit of parsley, some chicken salt, a springle of MSG you get cheesy rice! Fucking brilliant.

Continental Cheesy Rice

There used to be a Continental cheesy rice sachet thing I loved when I was a kid. I haven’t had it for decades so I had no idea if they still do it. The real thing was a surprise I didn’t know I needed, but I was curious so I googled it. And what the controversy!

The old cheesy rice packaging was sort of tan, green and red. The packaging is composited against a wooden benchtop with badges proclaiming: "no artificial colours & flavours" and "proudly made in Australia"

The new packaging is green, teal and red. It's less good. Also it's just "cheesy" rice now, not "tasty cheesy rice".

The product is still listed on the Continental website, but the product reviews section is abuzz with activity. Lucy says:

This is my sons favourite food! I add garlic and ginger to spice it up and we love it! We have it at least twice a week. Please tell me you will never discontinue this product! I have just found out woolworths will no longer be selling this product. I am so disappointed. It looks like Coles still sell it so they will become my new weekly shopping destination.

To which the team at Continental replied:

Hi there, Lucy! We are glad that your family are enjoying our Cheesy rice. The team will be thrilled to hear this feedback and rest assured this will be noted for future product development. This has been deleted in Woolies and Coles, but you may still find this in IGA. Hope this helps!

Deleted in Woolies and Coles! I don’t know how Lucy will be able to rest assured about that.

I can’t say I’m hugely surprised it’s disappearing, given the explosion of the more convenient pouch- and microwaveable-rice segment. But the loyal Cheesy Rice consumers are not to be underestimated. Zarli says:

I have been eating cheesy rice for at least 7 years and I don’t think I’ll ever stop. I have it with creamy garlic prawns , chicken wedges , any other meal , on a sandwhich , by itself. I might turn into a cheesy rice if I keep going but please never stop making cheesy rice it’s the best thing ever

One thing is clear, the fans will be devastated when this made-in-Australia staple of ’90s pantries finally stops production. I might pop down to IGA and see if I can hunt down a packet for old time’s sake. Bit of weird food nostalgia.

That said, one reviewer wasn’t happy with the product at all. Phil gave it a scathing 1 out of 5 stars, saying “Not very cheesy.”

“The previous packs from last year were 100% better”

This is my favourite post-workout snack. No long intro, here goes:

Ingredients

350ml cold water
1 small banana
75g blueberries (frozen is better)
A teaspoon of cacao/cocoa
A generous dumping of chia seeds
Vanilla vegan protein
Sponsored: A spoon of greens powder (or just chuck in some spinach)
Optional: Couple of dates for sweetness
Optional: A teaspoon of flax seeds or similar
Optional: A couple of almonds or walnuts
Optional: A handful of mint to add a bit of zing

Without the optional extras you’re looking at about 1600 kilojoules, so tweak accordingly.

Method

Just blend it.

My blender manual suggests liquids first, then fresh fruit, seeds and powders, finally the frozen stuff.

Why I like it

The sweetness from the banana with the flavour from the blueberries, a bit of an icy texture along with some thickness from the chia seeds makes this a fresh and tasty smoothie for a hot day. It’s perfect when you just get back from a workout.

The backstory

There used to be n acai bowl place downstairs at work called “Kiss the Berry,” a name I always hated because it just sounds euphemistic and you can find literally anything on Urban Dictionary.

Nevertheless I used to enjoy working out in the mornings, riding into work, and picking up a protein smoothie from KTB to start my day. Nothing better.

Many years later I’d moved overseas, come back, and then one day I figured I’d start experimenting to try to recreate the magic. And I don’t know if this is that close, but it’s delicious for sure.

Nutrition and justifying my choices

It’s important to have a variety of stuff in your diet, so I like to throw in various seeds and nuts and fruits which disappear into the mix without affecting the flavour too much. I’ve mostly been putting stuff in that sounds good based on things I think I’ve heard sometime. But I just went on Wikipedia and fact-checked myself and here’s what I found:

The chia seeds (and flax seeds) are a good source of omega 3s which are important fats that are tricky to get. I don’t think they’re as good as fish oils, but they’re also a source of fibre and various vitamins and minerals. And I stupidly bought a kilo of flaxseeds from Costco that time so I’ve got to get through them somehow.

Nuts are high in calories, but they’re also good for you so what better time to smash them than after a workout. I bought some walnuts and decided I don’t especially like the taste of walnuts (also omega 3s), so I threw them in on a whim one day and then kept doing it.

Spinach is obviously a green and is generally good. But it’s the weak point here: It doesn’t blend amazingly well and if you add too much you can definitely taste it. But it’s a great way to get rid of a bag of leaves going unloved in your fridge, and I find pre-blending it and turning it into green hulklike ice cubes works best for me.

I have no idea if the greens powders you can get from your average pharmacy/snake oil salesman are actually worth a damn, and I’d suspect probably not. But they’re easy and generally have sweeteners in them to give the smoothie a bit of a lift.

I really like Bulk Nutrients Earth Protein for no reason other than it’s the first one I tried and it’s pretty good. Vegan protein is unlike whey protein, in that you should look for a mix of (usually) rice and pea protein to get a full amino acid profile. Though you can buy them separately, neither are complete on their own. I just find vegan protein blends super well to make a nice refreshing water-based smoothie, whereas whey doesn’t. When I accidentally put whey protein in, it all goes terribly wrong and somehow turns fluffy, it’s not good.

Other stuff I’ve included at various times:

a shot of espresso, back when I was a caffeine junkie. It wasn’t great tbh. Granulated coffee works better.
mango chunks — you can buy a big bag of it frozen. Sometimes when I’m out of blubes I’ll turn it into a full-on mango smoothie and it’s not as good, but one does what one must.
spaghetti – spaghetti? No, you must be mistaken, I didn’t say that.
mint – the original smoothie from the place downstairs was a ‘mint slice’, heavy on the mint and cocoa. I can’t grow mint because I live in darkness, but occasionally I’ll buy it special, and it’s really good.
dates – they’re good to add some sweetness when the bananas aren’t super ripe but they’re pretty calorific so make your judgements

That’s about it. Do you have a favourite smoothie?

Tag: recipe

How good is cheesy rice tho