Trail Arroz Caldo
Filipino rice porridge rebuilt around instant rice, freeze-dried chicken, and a fish sauce packet.
- calories
- 620
- weight
- 5.5 oz
- cal / oz
- 113
- protein
- 30 g
- serves
- 1, scales
- prep
- 5 min
- cook
- 15 min
- total time
- 20 min
- water
- 700 ml boiled
- cost
- $$
Calorie and protein figures are my own estimates, good enough for planning a food bag and not meant as precise nutrition data.
- Dinner
- Breakfast
- Canister stove
- Liquid fuel
- Campfire coals
- Backpacking
- Car camping
- Basecamp
- Winter / snow
- Dairy free
- Nut free
- One pot
- Pre-mix at home
- Shelf stable
- Basic
Ingredients
| Instant white rice | 1/2 cup | cooks down to porridge if you overwater it on purpose |
|---|---|---|
| Glutinous rice flour | 1 tbsp | the thickener that replaces long-simmered sticky rice |
| Freeze-dried chicken | 1.5 oz | |
| Chicken bouillon | 1 cube or 1 tsp powder | |
| Dried minced garlic | 1 tbsp | |
| Dried minced onion or shallot | 1 tbsp | |
| Ground dried ginger | 1 tsp | more than feels right; this dish is a ginger dish |
| Ground turmeric | 1 tsp | color, mostly |
| Fish sauce | 1 tsp | packet or a small leakproof dropper bottle |
| Olive oil | 1 tbsp | |
| Fried garlic | 1 tbsp | sold in jars at any Asian grocery, carries fine in a bag |
| Dried chives or scallion flakes | 1 tsp | |
| Salt and black pepper | to taste | |
| Lemon juice powder or a lime | 1/2 tsp | stands in for calamansi |
Method
- Pour the oil into the pot and warm it. Add the dried garlic, onion, and ginger and stir for about thirty seconds, until they smell like something. They scorch fast, so keep them moving.
- Add 700 ml of water, the bouillon, turmeric, and freeze-dried chicken. Bring it to a boil and hold it there two minutes so the chicken rehydrates before the starch goes in.
- Stir in the instant rice and the glutinous rice flour. Whisk the flour in as you pour or it will clump.
- Drop to a low simmer for five to eight minutes, stirring often. The bottom will catch if you walk away.
- Off the heat, add the fish sauce, then salt and pepper. Let it sit two minutes; it keeps thickening.
- Top with fried garlic, chives, and the lemon powder or a squeeze of lime.
Arroz caldo is normally an hour of simmering: raw rice, bone broth, a whole head of garlic. None of that fits a stove that burns fuel by the minute. The shortcut is instant rice plus a spoonful of glutinous rice flour, which does the thickening that a long simmer would otherwise do. You get the porridge texture in eight minutes instead of forty.
The aromatics are the part not to trim. Dried garlic, onion, and ginger bloomed in oil for thirty seconds taste far more like the real thing than the same powders dumped into water. Fish sauce is the other load-bearing ingredient; leave it out and you have salty rice. The fried garlic on top is not a garnish either, it is the crunch that keeps a bowl of soft starch from getting boring halfway down.
Packing
Everything dry goes in one bag except the fried garlic, which goes in its own small bag so it stays crisp. Oil and fish sauce ride in dropper bottles inside a ziplock.
Variations
- A hard-boiled egg, cooked the morning you leave, holds a day or two in cool weather and is the traditional topping.
- Skip the chicken and use vegetable bouillon plus soy sauce instead of fish sauce for a meatless pot.
- A packet of chicken instead of freeze-dried works, but drain it or the pot goes greasy.
https://www.maritimeglutton.com/arroz-caldo-recipe-filipino