Sticky rice in bananaleaves- also called Khao Tom Madt in Thai- is a very common snack/dessert you can buy from streetvendors. They taste wonderfully sweet from the coconut milk, the soft ripe banana and then the contradiction, which is so common in Thai food: little salty black beens in the middle of all the sweetness.
Thai desserts/ snacks are often this funny combinations of contradictions: sweet/salty/sour/.
Sticky rice ( glutinous rice) is eaten in many different ways- sometimes you roll it to a ball and dip it in sauces, sometimes its steamed in bananaleaves and fílled with sweet or savoury things- or like here banana and black beans and sometimes, rolled to a triangle with chicken, beans and hot stuff. I have read somewhere that sticky rice makes you very tired so never eat more than a handfull or you’ll be very tired! But if this is actually true or not I dont know;)
Here is yet one of my unprecise recipies:
1 kg Sticky / Glutionus rice
1-2 cans of coconut milk
Sugar (sugar cane sugar or palm sugar) lots of it
Some salt
Black salted beans
Bananas/ plantaine
Banana leaves ( to steam in.)
The rice:
1. Rinse the rice till the water comes out clear. It takes a while. Leave the rice to soak in fresh cold water for 5-6 hours. Change the water a couple of times.
2. Drain the rice. Steam them in a bamboo steamer i a nice even layer on some damp cloth or some baking paper for about 30-40 minutes.
3. Cook the rice with coconut milk, sugar and salt to taste ( it has to be sweet yet a tiny bit salty) stir and cook untill all the coconut milk has been absorbed in the rice. They shouldnt get too hard or too soft- they must never be soggy!
Preparations of the leaves and wrapping:
1.Cut the leaves into pieces that are appropiate, put them in the sink, pour boiling water over them and dry them carefully with a clean cloth. Grease the pieces of leaves so the rice wont stick to them.
2. Place a suitable layer of rice, a little piece of banana and some beans in the midle then rice on top. press it together to a small cake and wrap the package as you see on the picture. Continue till you run out of rice.
The Steaming:
Place the wrapped rice in a bamboo steamer and steam them till they are done- maybe 10-20 minutes, depending on the size.
You can freeze them and reheat them in a steamer or the microwave- this snack takes so long to make it seems more economic to make a lot of them and freeze them;)