For Asians, cooking rice as simple as pressing a button. Rinse the rice, add water, pop pot in rice cooker and press the button. Rice will be ready in less than 30 minutes.
With Asians, the rice cooker is a must have for newly-weds. Today its funny to watch college students packing their rice cooker together with their laptops, Xboxes, mini fridge, microwave and a ton of other things they can’t seem to live without. They’ve discovered that you can cook whole meals in a rice cooker.
It’s worth investing in one if you cook rice often enough. You can get rice cookers that look like spaceships for hundreds of dollars but I have my trusty one that costs less than $30. It even has a button for brown rice. You can also cook quinoa in it.
Here are three ways to cook rice. If you don’t have a rice cooker, you can easily cook rice on the stove top or in the microwave.
Rice cooker method
This is the simplest method.
Makes 3 (standard) cups cooked rice
Preparation time: 5 minutes
Cooking time: 25 minutes
2 cups rice (using cup provided with rice cooker)
Water
Measure rice with rice cup provided and put rice inside pot of cooker. Wash and rinse rice till water is clear. Fill water up to level 2 marked in pot. Wipe pot dry, and place in rice cooker. Cover and press Cook.
Rice is ready when cooking switches to the Warm button. Let rice sit for 5 or more minutes before serving.
NOTES
Please note there are two different measures of cups here. One is the standard measuring cup and the other is the rice cup provided with rice cooker (which is ¾ standard measuring cup.).
Stove Top Method
Makes 3 cups cooked rice
Preparation time: 5 minutes
Cooking time: 20-25 minutes
1½ cups rice
1¾-2 cups water
(Cup measures here are standard cup measures.)
In a 2 quart saucepan, rinse rice until water is quite clear.
Add water. To measure correct amount of water the Chinese way, stick thumb into water resting tip of thumb on the top of the rice. Click here for details. Water should reach just below knuckle, about ¾ inch deep, or 1¾ cup water.
Bring water to a boil, about 5-7 minutes. As soon as it starts bubbling, reduce heat to lowest temperature, cover pan, and let rice simmer for 10-14 minutes. Turn off heat. Leave rice to sit until ready to serve.
NOTES
–When cooking more than 4 cups of rice, measure water up to knuckle of thumb. Bring to boil but leave rice to simmer on low heat 10-15 minutes longer than above recipe. Check periodically to see if rice has absorbed the water. Remove from heat when water is absorbed and rice is done. Allow it to sit for 10-15 minutes.
–Simmer on lowest setting. Otherwise the rice may burn at the bottom of the pot.
Microwave Method
I like my microwave pot because the same pot used to cook is attractive enough to serve at the table and goes easily into the fridge when there is leftover rice. The same microwave pot can be used to reheat the rice. Glass or Pyrex casseroles may also be used, as long as they have lids.
Microwave rice follows the same technique as cooking rice in a regular pot—bring the water to a boil and then simmer it covered at low heat.
Makes 3 cups cooked rice
Preparation time: 5 minutes
Cooking time: 20-25 minutes
1½ cups rice
1¾-2 cups water
(Cup measures here are standard cup measures.)
In a microwave pot rinse rice until water is clear.
Add water to rice. Measure level of water up to the knuckle of thumb. Or it should be about ¾ inch above the level of the rice.
Microwave uncovered on high for 8-10 minutes until water is brought to a boil. Then cover and microwave on level 4 for another 9-10 minutes. Leave rice to sit for 5-10 minutes before serving.
NOTES
–Because every microwave is different, times may vary. The goal is to bring the water to a boil. If it boils too long, the water will flow over. When trying it the first time, put a dish under the pot to catch any overflow.
After you have determined the time to bring it to boil in your microwave, you can keep the pot covered from the start to finish, set the two levels of cooking at one go and not have tend to it midway through cooking. It is a very efficient way of cooking rice. You can tell your diners that the rice will be cooked in 23 minutes!
