Place the rice, milk, cream and sugar in a saucepan over medium/ low heat. Carefully slice the vanilla lengthways and scrape out the seeds. Add both the seeds and pods to the milk.
Bring the mixture to a boil, turn down the heat and allow to gently simmer for 40 minutes.
After 40 minutes, the vanilla rice pudding may still seem quite runny but as it cools the remaining liquid will be absorbed.