Great Rice...

[H4ever]

The chicken cacciatore thread brought this to my mind. I prefer Basmati rice when I make rice. I read somewhere that rice is a staple in the diets of 2/3rds the earth's population.

I know a lot of folks use rice steamers to make rice. I don't have one so I make it the old fashion way by boiling it in a sauce pan. Keeping the pot covered throughout the cooking process is the key to great rice. Otherwise you end up with a clump of sticky rice.

I rinse the basmati rice to remove excess starches, and keep the water level about a half inch above the rinsed rice. I also add one tbl spoon of oil. Bring to a boil (never take the lid off), and then simmer until rice plumps up in the pot and all water has evaporated.

How do you all make your rice? Anyone who uses instant rice should be shot in the face. :D

[Mikey]

Basmati is good. If you like basmati you should try jasmine rice. Similar but with a nice fragrance.

Right now we're using calrose, which my kids call "sticky rice". Shorter grain and a more sticky texture, good for sushi.

I generally buy rice in large bags. 25 lb for the calrose (several months supply here), 10 lb or whatever they have at Costco for basmati. Jasmine rice you have to get at the supermarket in 2 lb or 5 lb bags. Also good is the classic Italian risotto which in the US is usually arborio rice. Problem it's pretty labor intensive. You can't just put it on the stove and come back later.

Brown rice and wild rice are also good, but have much different flavors and take longer to cook.

[H4ever]

Have tried Jasmine and it's good. Prefer Basmati but will go with Jasmine should the other not be in stock or at the price I want.

Not a big fan of sticky rice varieties. They seem like a botched cooking job to me.

[smackaholic]

Anyone who buys instant rice should be shot.

Not that I care what they eat, it's just good public policy to off folks that stupid.

We have a cooker. Works great and is idiot proof enough that fubu clown could almost use it. Trouble is though, it takes like about, ohh, a week, week and a half to make in the cooker. Wifey uses it because it's idiot proof and her attention deficit disorder is nowhere near as bad as mine. I want my fukking rice 10 minutes ago, but, I will settle with 20 minutes from now, which is about what it takes.

My recipe.....

Use rice. What kind? Fukk, I dunno. The white kind. Long grain, I 'spose is what it usually says. I'll leave the bassomatic rice or any of that other fancy stuff to uppity liberal "buy organic" hippies.

Put 1 part rice, 2 parts water on stove set at full afterburner. Watch closely or set timer to about 4 minutes and go watch pron, but, don't bother with pulling it. You haven't the time.

When buzzer goes off, make sure browser history is deleted, run to kitchen and stir that shit before it burns to the bottom of the pan. It should be boiling now, if not, it will be shortly.

As soon as it comes to a boil, turn down to low or warm or whatever. Cover, set timer to 14 minutes. That should be time enough for, well, you know.

Once it has been turned down, do not stir. If you do, mikey will come to your house and beat you with a wooden spoon like my dago gramma used to do us. Also, your rice will suck ass.

[Mikey]

Still using Uncle Ben's?

Still not sure what "converted" means, but I don't think it has anything to do with 'ligion.

[smackaholic]

Converted rice translates to "sucks almost as bad as minute rice" I think.

[Mikey]

BTW, that bassomatic rice comes in 10 lb bags at Costco.

Plus, you get a cool burlap bag that you can scent with some patchoulli oil and use to carry around filled with samples of your homemade wind chimes, or whatever.

[missjo]

I use mainly Jasmine rice as I tend to cook a lot of Asian style dishes
jasmine absorbs less water generally 1 cup of rice to 1 1/2 cups water
I used a rice cooker as I'm usually too busy making the rest of the dishes to watch what the rice is doing on the stove'
If you load the cooker before you start everything else the rice is done by the time you're ready to dish up

[Mikey]

I also appreciate the "set it and forget it" aspect of the rice cooker.

[indyfrisco]

I don't do rice nearly much as I would like. Basically, my wife eats 2 things: Cheese Pizza and Baked Pasta. I make all the food in the house and each night I am making 3 different meals. One for my wife, one for my kids and one for me. I don't like to make so much that I have tons of leftovers as I like variety in my meals day after day.

That being said, I have an assortment of rices. I use jasmine and a sticky rice. When I make fried rice, I actually like to use the sticky rice. I'm a big fan of sticky rice. I prefer it over the rice that separates well. Even when I use jaspine rice, I put a little extra water in it so it makes it a little stickier.

I make burritos a lot for myself. I love mexican rice in my burritos. I will take a can of enchilada sauce, about a teaspoon of cumin, a half can of water and cook the jasmine rice in this. Makes great mexican rice with little to no effort. Then I load up my burritos with grilled chicken, rice, refried beans from the can mixed with cumin, sour cream, mont jack and cheddar cheese and shredded lettuce and fresh diced jalapeno. Good eats really quick.

[smackaholic]

makes it shitty tasting too.

[indyfrisco]

makes it shitty tasting too.

I've never had a rice, cooked in only water, that had much in the way of taste. The texture of it and what you put in and on it are what makes rice a good rice. Plain rice, while not distasteful, lacks in true taste.

[smackaholic]

makes it shitty tasting too.

I've never had a rice, cooked in only water, that had much in the way of taste. The texture of it and what you put in and on it are what makes rice a good rice. Plain rice, while not distasteful, lacks in true taste.

OK, I'll buy that statement. Let me amend mine to... makes it shitty textured, too.

[PSUFAN]

I've learned one good trick with cooking rice. What I do is saute onion and some garlic and usually some purple cabbage or kale (mostly for the vitamins in them) in a healthy portion of butter, and add in the uncooked rice. If you saute the raw rice grains with the veggies and the butter and some stock for about 5-7 minutes prior to adding the water, you seal in a lot of flavor, and you can really bring out the flavor of the grain - especially when you're cooking with basmati. I never understood how restaurants always got that consistency to the rice without pouring in tons of cooking oil and literally "frying" it after it had been cooked off...until I tried this.

[indyfrisco]

PSU,

I do that as well a lot. I like to cook the rice in some kind of fat, usually EVOO, just until it starts to brown before adding chicken stock or beef stock. I never use water when I have stock available unless I am making a sticky rice for sushi.

Speaking of sushi, I made this awhile back. Can't remember if I ever posted the pic. Taken with my blackberry camera so not the best, but if you like Spicy Tuna Rolls, this one you would have loved. I fried up a lot of tempura flakes and loaded up the inside with raw tuna, rice, tempura flakes and sriracha along with some roasted and fried garlic pieces. Awesome.



And Dins, yes, I remember what you said about round-eye using chopsticks. I still do it when eating sushi in a sushi bar or if I make it myself.

[H4ever]

I've learned one good trick with cooking rice. What I do is saute onion and some garlic and usually some purple cabbage or kale (mostly for the vitamins in them) in a healthy portion of butter, and add in the uncooked rice. If you saute the raw rice grains with the veggies and the butter and some stock for about 5-7 minutes prior to adding the water, you seal in a lot of flavor, and you can really bring out the flavor of the grain - especially when you're cooking with basmati. I never understood how restaurants always got that consistency to the rice without pouring in tons of cooking oil and literally "frying" it after it had been cooked off...until I tried this.

Sounds great. I'll give it a try.