I don’t know if it’s just the salt or something else, but often after 8 or more hours on the bike I crave Bubbie’s Sauerkraut.
Today a recipe for my infamous vegan rice bars. It’s based on Allen Lim’s rice cakes. I often take 1-3 of these on brevets. It’s nice to have a break from packaged energy bars and Twizzlers.
Moist Vegan Rice Bars
I make this in a pressure cooker, as I’ve mentioned before, cook rice in your pressure cooker at your own risk.
Basically put all ingredients in the pan and stir well. Bring up the pressure. Cook for 12 min at 9000 ft, (probably 9 min at 5,000 ft, or 6 min at sea level). Turn off heat. Let pressure naturally release. When you open up the cooker the rice mixture will be pretty well compressed. Once it’s cooled, it can be cut into bars. Then the bars can be wrapped in foil. I don’t bother with forming the mixture into a rectangular pan. I’ve been able to get firmer bars by cooking everything together and not disturbing the mixture after the cooking is done. I just make a square in the middle, and usually cut 8 bars from that. Then piece together the halved, rounded edges to make 4 more bars.
You can experiment with the amount of water to make firmer, less moist bars. 3 cups makes a very moist bar, that still keeps it’s shape pretty well when cool. The ramen, miso and even tofu are absorbing some of the water, along with the rice. If you cook the rice first and then add ingredients and compress, similar to the way the Lim video shows, you’ll probably want 1 c. sushi rice to 1-1/2 c. water.
Also, some people may want more salt when they’re riding. If so you could add 1 tsp salt to the ingredients. You can also try other flavors and ingredients. Lim uses cheese in his. I’ve tried using Daiya in my rice bars and haven’t been very happy with that flavor during rides.
This video best shows Allen Lim’s foil wrapping technique, unfortunately he’s making ham, cream cheese, and jelly croissant sandwiches.
I’m not sure about other uses for rice bars. They are pretty tasty. They might make a good school or work lunch or after workout snack.
