Creamy, Vegan Millet Porridge with Coconut Milk

Make the creamiest, calcium rich porridge with the ancient grain known as millet. Best of all, these tiny granules take just 20 minutes to cook.

If you love rice pudding and cozy, warm porridges for breakfast, you'll love this hot cereal made from an underrated but powerful whole grain.

What is Millet?

Millet is a gluten free, high fiber cereal that packs a lot of punch into a tiny little yellow grain.

Resistant to drought and pests, it can survive harsh environments and poor soil.

Perhaps that is one reason millet is commonly grown in African and Asian nations.

Calcium Rich

This tiny little ancient grain also has the highest amount of calcium compared to other grains.

One cup or 100g will provide 13% of the recommended daily value of calcium.

For more info on the numerous health benefits of millet, this post from World's Healthiest Foods has rich information without any annoying ads.

Other uses for millet

Millet can be cooked and used just like other grains:

• add a handful to rice for a colorful yellow dotted rice
• cook like rice and add to stuffings for squash
• use in grain salads just like you would a rice salad or quinoa salad
• add to soups

In China, millet is commonly used to make a warm breakfast porridge.

Chinese Style Millet Porridge

In China, you can find this porridge bubbling in large vats on the street for hungry pedestrians on their way to work.

The Chinese version is thick but still soupy and more watery than a thick oatmeal.

Serve with your choice of sugar on the side such as coconut sugar, agave, or maple syrup.

Cooking Method

Porridge is hard to overcook isn't it?

The real challenge is making sure you have enough water in the pot so it doesn't stick and burn.

When you're trying to achieve bloated grains in porridge, a general rule is 1 part grain to 4 parts water.

My favorite painless way to cook porridge is in the rice cooker.

Alternately, the stovetop method goes rather quickly with millet, since the grains are so small.

Less than 30 minutes on the stovetop

1. Bring water to a boil
2. Add millet
3. Bring back to a boil
4. Keep stirring gently and cook for 20-30 minutes at simmer until grains are fully cooked. Add more water, if the porridge becomes more thick than you'd like it.
5. Taste for doneness. The grains should be soft and not gritty or hard.
6. Serve hot

Add Coconut Milk

Instead of using water, you could substitute half of the water with coconut milk.

Or, add coconut milk as a topping at the end.

I wouldn't use all coconut milk with no water, since it would very thick and hard to cook and stir without burning.

Helpful Tips

1. This can be cooked in the rice cooker on the same setting as you would cook rice. Or porridge setting if your rice cooker has one.
2. Add diced pumpkin and sweet potatoes with the millet, if you'd like to cook them together for an orange porridge.
3. For extra flavor, you could toast the millet granules in some oil before adding the water. This makes it a wee bit less starchy tasting.
4. You could rinse your millet with water first, as you would rice or other grain, but that is a personal preference to wash off potential dust or toxins on the grains.

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