Since I cut most grains, nuts and seeds out of my diet, I’m pretty much stuck with rice milk as a dairy substitute instead of almond milk. Commercially prepared rice milk kind of makes me gag, plus most have unnecessary ingredients. Luckily making rice milk is fairly easy, though time-consuming. I made a double batch the other day and froze what I didn’t need immediately. Homemade rice milk is also thicker than commercially prepared and is a good replacement for cream in recipes. Water can be easily added to it to thin it out if necessary.
The benefit of making your own rice milk is the by-product can be used to make rice “cheese.” This was my first foray into making anything other than “cheese” sauce and it turned out surprising well. I used the rice “cheese” in my dairy free, gluten free, tomato free lasagna.
Rice Milk
1 cup brown rice
8 cups water
1 Tbs sea salt
In a large saucepot combine ingredients and bring to a simmer. Cover and cook on a low simmer for three hours, stirring often. Puree rice and water in a blender or food processor in batches, keeping the rice and water mixture as equal as possible. Once pureed, strain through a fine mesh sieve into a large bowl. Save the rice left in the sieve to make rice “cheese.” Add more salt to the rice milk, if it’s needed. Stevia or other sweetener can be added to your taste. Store for up to a week in the refrigerator or freeze.
Rice “Cheese”
2 cups cooked, pureed rice
2 Tbs nutritional yeast
1/4 cup rice milk
1 Tbs arrowroot
1/2 tsp granulated garlic
1/2 tsp salt
In a small saucepot, combine rice, yeast, garlic and salt. Stir well and bring to a simmer. Make a slurry with the rice milk and arrowroot. Pour slurry into the rice mixture. Stir continuously until it has simmered for about two minutes. Remove from heat and pour into a well-oiled dish. Cover and chill until firm. Turn out of dish and slice. For a softer cheese leave out the arrowroot and rice milk.
Crafty Cookery 
I am going to try this! We recently went dairy free as my family are celiacs and we are testing the waters to see if they are also sensitive to casein. I just cut out all dairy and did not replace any of it since most alternative “dairy” options are filled with stuff I will not or cannot eat (like carageenan! or Agave).
Good luck! I finally gave up since I don’t have the energy to make mediocre cheeze when there are better tasting things out there to cook. LOL! Best store brought brand I’ve tried is Daiya. It’s mostly tapioca starch, I believe. I still miss good cheddar cheese, even though it’s been over two years since I’ve been mostly dairy free (I keep trying it & keep reacting to it). I use a lot of coconut milk with salt and an acid (vinegar or lemon juice) to replace cow’s milk when cooking and have even used it to make caramel. Honey can be used as a replacement for agave in all my recipes.
I live in Cleveland, TN – is there anywhere within 30 miles that distributes rice cheese?
Lisanatti Foods makes rice based “cheeses” called RiceCheeze. Their website had a store locator so you can see if any stores near you carry it: http://www.lisanatti.com
I now usually buy tapioca based “cheeses” from Daiya. My local grocery store carries three varieties of it (cheddar, mozzarella, and pepper jack).
Hi,
Could you let me know what the cheese is meant to look like?
My rice milk was very thick – not really ‘pourable’…
And the cheese looked like it still have lots of rice in – perhaps i did not puree it enough?
Any tips on texture / look of how the rice milk and rice cheese ‘should’ look would be great!
Thanks!
Maybe add more water to the rice milk? I only tried the recipe once since I decided it was too much work and I could do without it. My “cheese” had the consistency of Velveeta and I pureed it until there weren’t any lumps. Sorry it took me so long to reply!
I don’t know how to change the texture of the rice flower to be more like cheese. I do puree mine for about 2 mins, but that’s with the Vitamix. For every cup of rice I used 4 cups of water. I used dry rice, maybe dry cooked on the over in a pan, and let soak a while.
The results were good enough that I will be making more, because it’s cheap.
I still not sure how to change the texture though, but the cheese can still spread, but slightly crumbly.
Good luck!
Okay this is only a suggestion. I make rice milk I sometimes heat the dry, raw rice in a pan a few minutes, and they let it sit a few hours or more in water, and then I add more water, dates for sweetness, salt, a tad of yeast, a small amount of sugar, and vanilla extract. etc, and blend for about 2 minutes. When done I use cheese cloth, after I strain out the milk, then the rest is for cheese. (The yeast has a kinda cheesy taste, and seems to add good flavor to me anyways. : )
After the milk is filtered through the strainer the rice flower left should be moist, but not dry, and not real soupy either. When it’s a bit dry I melt butter, add that, and add more salt for taste, and maybe more yeast. I add soy sauce, and maybe more sugar for taste. This may take some time to get it right. I have only done this once, and the cheese taste pretty good, but the texture is NOT together like cheese, but the taste of the milk, and cheese is pretty good. The milk is almost exactly like the milk you buy at the store.
Hope this helps, and sorry I have no measurements. It’s just an experiment, but the results Iare good. We have made this milk twice, and both times turned out fine. The rice I dry roasted? on the oven seem to taste a little better.
Thanks for the tips! Hopefully they’ll help some of my other readers, Unfortunately for me rice now increases my inflammation and is out of my diet.
Hi 🙂 which rice do you normally use for the cheese? Can’t wait to try!
I used whatever I had on hand, usually a short grained white rice or brown rice.