Recipe
🍰 DESSERT
Pulut Hitam
A warm porridge of black glutinous rice sweetened with palm sugar and finished with salty coconut cream, a Nyonya classic.
Singaporean · easy · serves 4
prep 10 min · cook 60 min
~641 cal · 6g protein · 110g carbs · 21g fat · 2g fiber · 58g sugars · 18g sat fat (estimated, per serving)
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Pulut hitam, black glutinous rice porridge, is a beloved dessert across Singapore, Malaysia, and Indonesia, with deep roots in Peranakan (Nyonya) cooking. Comforting and not too sweet, it is served warm or cold as a soothing end to a meal.
Nutty black glutinous rice is simmered slowly until the grains burst and the whole thing turns thick, dark, and porridge-like, sweetened with dark palm sugar (gula melaka) and often perfumed with pandan. The essential finishing touch is a swirl of thick, salted poured over the top, whose richness and salt play against the earthy, sweet rice.
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Make it yours
✓ Naturally vegetarian, vegan and gluten-, dairy-, egg- and pork-free. No swaps needed.
Toggle a diet and the ingredients rewrite themselves with regional substitutes.
🥕 Vegetarian
🌱 Vegan
🌾 Gluten-Free
🥛 Dairy-Free
🥜 Nut-Free
🥚 Egg-Free
🐖 Pork-Free
Dietary labels are a cooking guide, not allergen-safety advice. We track dairy, egg, gluten, tree nuts and peanuts (we count coconut as a tree nut, following FDA labeling), fish, and shellfish; we do not screen for sesame, soy, mustard, celery, or sulphites. If you have a food allergy, read the label on every product you use, and note that a kitchen can cross-contaminate in ways a recipe cannot control.
Ingredients
US
Metric
Serves 4
1 cup black glutinous rice, soaked at least 5 hours
1/4 cup white glutinous rice
1/3 cup rock sugar
3/4 cup palm sugar (gula melaka)
Hard to find? dark muscovado sugar, or coconut palm sugar with a little molasses - gula melaka is coconut-palm sap boiled down and set in cylinders, so it is darker and faintly smoky; muscovado is the closest thing in an ordinary cupboard and molasses on its own is far too strong
2 pandan leaf
Hard to find? a few drops of pandan paste or extract - pandan is sometimes called Asian vanilla, and vanilla will stand in at a pinch, but it gives you the sweetness without the nutty, grassy side
1 cup
1/2 tsp salt
Instructions
1
Simmer the soaked black rice with plenty of water and the pandan, stirring often, until the grains burst and the porridge thickens, about 50 minutes.
2
Stir in the palm sugar and rock sugar until dissolved.
✎ Chef’s note
Cook the rice long enough that the grains truly burst and release their starch; that is what makes the porridge thick rather than watery. A handful of white glutinous rice alongside the black is the usual trick for a creamier result, and rock sugar alongside the gula melaka gives a milder sweetness than plain white sugar. If it is still loose, either stir in a little cornflour slaked with water or simply let it stand a few hours, since it thickens as it sits.
3
Warm the coconut cream with the salt separately.
4
Serve the porridge warm or chilled, with the salted coconut cream in a jug so everyone pours their own.
✎ Chef’s note
The same dessert is bubur ketan hitam in Indonesia and bee koh moy in Hokkien, and it is eaten as happily cold as hot.
Singaporean Peranakan tradition.
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🌏 While it simmers, know your destination
📍
Singapore. Singapore argues about food in public, and its hawker centres are the arena, where Hainanese chicken rice is close to a national referendum. Chinese, Malay, Indian, and Peranakan kitchens sit side by side, producing laksa, chilli crab, and char kway teow.
🗺️
Singapore. Singapore is a hawker-center paradise where Malay, Chinese, Indian, and Peranakan cuisines collide, Hainanese chicken rice, chili crab, laksa, and kaya toast. Food is the national obsession, and the hawker stall its temple.
🌍
Asia. A grain line runs across the continent. Rice dominates the wet south and east, wheat the drier north and west, and the tools follow it: the wok and the steamer where rice is milled, the tandoor and the griddle where wheat is ground. Tea travels the other way, drunk green, black, salted, buttered or with milk depending how far it got from China.
The story behind this dish is up top, worth a read while the pot works.
More from Singapore
Hainanese Chicken RiceSilken poached chicken over rice cooked in its broth, with chili-ginger sauce, Singapore’s national obsession.
Kaya ToastToasted bread spread with coconut-egg kaya jam and butter, with soft-cooked eggs and kopi.
Bak Kut TehPork ribs simmered in a peppery, garlicky broth, Singapore's restorative bowl eaten with rice and dough fritters.
Browse all Singapore recipes →
Good to know
Storing it: Thickens as it sits. Reheat with extra water or milk to loosen, and keep 2 to 3 days refrigerated.
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Frequently asked questions
What is Pulut Hitam?
A warm porridge of black glutinous rice sweetened with palm sugar and finished with salty coconut cream, a Nyonya classic.
Where does Pulut Hitam come from?
Pulut Hitam is a Singaporean dish from Singapore, Singapore.
Can Pulut Hitam be made vegan, gluten-free, or dairy-free?
This Pulut Hitam recipe includes substitution suggestions for vegetarian, vegan, gluten-free, dairy-free, nut-free, egg-free, and pork-free versions, including several at once such as gluten-free and dairy-free together. Treat them as a starting guide rather than a guarantee, and see the allergen note below.
Is Pulut Hitam safe for people with food allergies?
Our dietary labels and substitutions are a cooking guide, not medical or allergen-safety advice. We track dairy, egg, gluten, tree nuts and peanuts (we count coconut as a tree nut, following FDA labeling), fish, and shellfish, but we do not screen for sesame, soy, mustard, celery, or sulphites. If you have a food allergy, always read the label on every product you use, and remember a home or commercial kitchen can cross-contaminate ingredients in ways a recipe cannot control.
How long does Pulut Hitam take to make?
About 70 minutes total (10 minutes prep, 60 minutes cooking), serving 4.
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