Waterless Cookware Blog

Sticky or clingy rice (more often than not) is the result of the type of rice cooked, not the cooking or the cook.  Similarly, light fluffy individuated rice is also the outcome of the type of rice used.   If your rice isn’t cooking the way you desire, it isn’t you.  It’s more likely the type of rice.

If sticky or clingy rice is the outcome desired (for rice balls, wraps, sushi, clumps ideal for chop sticks), consider short-grain or medium grain parboiled or converted rice.  For light fluffy rice, use long-grained rice varieties.

Brown rice can be short, medium or long grained.  This type of rice requires two-to-three times longer to cook but the health advantages shouldn’t be dismissed because of time.  Brown rice has retained the outer fruit and seed coats, the embryo, plus the oil- and enzyme-rich aleurone layer.  During a normal cooking cycle, the nutrients of brown rice seep into the germ adding color, aroma, and a taste often referred to as mildly nutty.

Milled white rice, for the most, is mainly starch and protein.  Quick cook rice (white, brown, or parboiled) is fissured to disrupt the cell wall of the grain.  Methods of producing fissured rice include dry heat, rolling, microwaving or freeze-drying.  Fissured rice more readily absorbs water, thus quick cooked.  But faster is not necessarily better in the long run.   Much is sacrificed as the whole rice kernel is milled into a ghost of its natural self.

In the short run, choose the type of rice designed to achieve the result you want.

Next up on the blog:  Stir Fry using the unique advantages and benefits of stainless steel waterless cookware to achieve optimal retention of nature’s good bounty—in the stir, and the rice.   Cook healthy, eat honestly, and thrive.