Healthy eight treasure congee also known as mixed congee, eight treasure porridge is a conge used to celebrate Laba festival. So it is also called as Laba congee.
Chinese people are quite enthusiastic about glutinous rice, which can be proofed by many holiday foods like Nian Gao(steamed rice cake also known as New Year Cake), Zi Ba (a food enjoyed by western province for mid-autumn day and spring festival), this mixed glutinous rice for Laba and rice dumpling for Lantern Festival.
Glutinous rice in this yummy congee adds the stickiness, not only making it more delicious but also floating large grains and beans and preventing them from sinking to the bottom of the bowl. So it will present as a uniform and yummy congee.
The ingredients used in this congee are not sticky clarified. In fact, the ingredient might differ ent based on different purpose (for old people or children) or seasons (winter and fall, summer and spring) and local preference. Besides the ingredients I given in the recipe, Job’s tear, millet, white kidney bean and lotus seed are also common ingredients for Chinese mixed congee. So it is your congee, it is your choice.
Some tips for making perfect mixed congee
The beans and seeds needs to be pre-soaked.
For high pressure cooker, we need to soak tough seeds like lotus seeds overnight and other beans for 3 hours.
For common pot without pressure mode, add more water and pre-soak the beans overnight and glutinous rice for 4 hours.
Eight Treasure Congee—Mixed Congee
Ingredients
- ½ cup glutinous rice
- 2 tablespoon black rice or any other type you prefer
- 1 tablespoon peanut
- 5 Chinese dried red dates
- 1 tablespoon mung beans
- 1 tablespoon red beans
- 1 tablespoon corn flakes
- 10 dried Longan
- ½ tablespoon walnut
- 6-10 cups of water depending on your cooking ware
Instructions
High pressure cooker:
- Pre-soak peanuts, mung beans and red beans, walnut for at least 4 hours and soak the rice for around 1 hour too. Place all the ingredients and pour around 6 cups of water. Cook for around 30 minutes until pressure mode or select beans option.
For pot without pressure mode:
- Pre-soak beans overnight and soak rice for at least 4 hours. Mix all the ingredients with 10 cups of water. Cook with strong heat to a boil, turn to low heat, cover and simmer for 40 to 60 minutes until all the ingredients are soft to taste. Leave a gap between the pot edge and cover to prevent the boiling congee from blowing out.
- Serve hot, optionally with a sweetening like sugar.
Nutrition
Is it a perfect breakfast with some soft bread or buns?
a c y h o z
AWH you cooked it soo beautiful!! I bet it's super tasty! I'm drooling right now haha! you website is amazing, thanks for the share <3 and may I ask you what kind of camera you are using? the pics are super great ^^
Elaine Luo
Thanks Acyhoz,
Thanks for stopping by and your lovely comment. I am using Cannon 600D in China equals to cannon T3i.
Zhou
Hi Elaine,
The wife loved this congee. I had another congee recipe but it has now been retired. I make congee or black rice/white rice soup once every couple of weeks. So thanks for the recipe, I’ll be making this often. It was a big hit.
Elaine Luo
Hi Zhou,
Thanks for your lovely feedback. You are such a caring husband. How lucky your wife is! Mixed congee should be perfect for the coming cold season.
Janet
I was curious about the corn flake ingredient. What is it's purpose in the congee? Is this a chinese ingredient different from our corn flake breakfast cereal?
Elaine
Hi Janet,
I believe they are almost the same. And there is no particular purpose of this ingredients. We are just mixing different ingredients in the congee and it is not a must.
Patrick
Can I use dried dates from the asian market?
Elaine
Yes Patrick, dried dates are what I use in the recipe.
QiuLin
Thank you for the recipe. I havent had thia since I lived in China, and it can be difficult to find good and authentkc recipes 🙂
Elaine
You are the most welcome!
Susanne
What do you mean by red beans? Red kidney beans or azuki beans? I'm very fond of both congee and porridge and would like to try tghis recipe, too.
Elaine
azuki beans.
Casey
Thanks for the recipe! Quick question: is the black rice sweet or glutinous, or is it just normal black rice? Thanks!
Elaine
Both types can work for this recipe.
kdb9953
i have a question about the recipe. Whenever I am presoaking the rice, do I need to presoak both glutinous rice and the black rice?
Elaine
Yes. If you use normal cooker, soak both of the rices.
Matthias
Amazing recipe, I also used black glutinous rice and added some spiced mandarin peel and cinnamon
Amanda
Is it possible to make a big batch and freeze the leftovers? I love this for breakfast but would love to save time in the morning
Elaine
Amanda,
No. Freezing will spoil the taste and flavor. You can use rice cooker to make this.