Can I Use Pudding Rice For The Rice Pudding Cake?

Our answer

Nigella's Rice Pudding Cake (from [COOK, EAT, REPEAT](/books/cook-eat repeat)) is a version of the Italian Torta di Riso. It uses arborio risotto rice. Risotto rice is short grained and starchy and the rice releases the starch as it cooks, which gives risotto its creamy consistency.

Pudding rice is also a short-grain starchy rice and a lot of the rice sold as pudding rice is sourced from Italy. The main difference between pudding rice and arborio rice is that arborio rice tends to remain slightly firm in the centre, even once cooked, and this can be important for the texture of the cake. Pudding rice can become a little too soft once cooked, which is fine if you are eating the rice in a warm, creamy pudding but can affect the texture of the finished cake. So on balance we would prefer to use arborio rice but if you do decide to use pudding rice then just bear in mind that the texture of the Rice Pudding Cake could be a little different.