==== ==== Having trouble cooking rice? Find out the best way to do it. http://reviewsofricecookers.org ==== ====
Most people who know about them or even own one are of the opinion that using rice cookers is a no-brainer. Actually, these devices are so simple to use you almost don't even need instructions. For the most part, you would be right. Because of its simplicity, one would be hard-pressed to find anybody who has actually written detailed instructions on how to get the most bang-for-your-buck out of one of these devices. What's even more surprising, most users don't know that you can make almost any kind of a meal in a rice cooker, without the rice. Yep, that's right. Try a goulash, potato salad, jambalaya or even a pasta dish. When the water is cooked out, the meal is done, just leave it on warm for additional cooking. Here's the way a Rice Cooker works. They start by boiling the rice and monitoring the temperature at the same time. Once all of the water has boiled away, the temperature then starts to rise, which in turn tells the rice cooker that the water is gone and to turn off or turn down. What this really means is if you don't put in enough water and when it boils away, your rice will be under-cooked; or if you use too much water then it will boil longer thus making the rice over-cooked. What you need to do is come up with the perfect ratio of rice to water. Occasionally you will find a box/bag of rice which has instructions on the back of the package, but a good ratio for most Rice Cookers is: 1 cup rice = 1 cup water, keeping in mind that 1 cup of uncooked rice is really 3/4 cup and the water is 1 cup. When done, this combination should produce about a 2 cup meal. Keep in mind, this is only a guideline. Different rice cookers may differ from one another, and different kinds of rice may require different amounts of water. Practice with your rice cooker with small amounts of rice and combinations of water. Once you master this technique, other dishes in your rice cooker will be a snap to make. Before cooking your rice in a rice cooker, you should always rinse it thoroughly. Place the rice in a large container filled with water, swirling the rice as you fill. Pour out the cloudy water and repeat. Do this a couple of times until the water start to look clear. When done, drain the rice as well as you can, then place it in the cooker, add the right amount of water, turn the rice cooker on, cover it and start cooking. Rice used to be coated with a fine dust of talc which kept it from sticking together during storage. The original purpose of rinsing rice was to remove this talc coating because it took the taste away from the rice. Today a starch-based anti-caking agent is used instead, which is completely edible, so many people have come to the conclusion that rinsing is now unnecessary, however, in a rice cooker rinsing the rice has another purpose: It makes the rice cook better. The theory for rinsing rice is as follows: The anti-caking agent in todays rice actually absorbs in the rice and binds some of the water in the pot into a thin film around each grain as the rice cooks.
This then prevents the water from being absorbed into the inner portions of the grain as quickly as it should, and also uses up some of the water so the cooker detects the end of the cooking cyle earlier, which means by the time the cooker has finished cooking, the insides of the grains are still slightly underdone. You could add a bit more water, to cause the rice cooker to cook longer, and thus get the rice properly done on the inside, but this has the result of making the outside of the rice slightly overdone. So it would appear that the best you can accomplish this way is both overdone and underdone at the same time, which isn't the same as done inside and out. If you rinse the anti-caking agent off before cooking, the rice will have a more consistent texture, and when cooked right should have a perfect soft but not mushy texture all the way through. Now, there is an exception to the rule for rinsing rice, and thats when you're cooking with Jasmine or Basmati Rice. Both are a "fragrant" rice and contain a lot of flavor, and that flavor can be washed down the drain by the rinsing process. Since this type of rice is long grain the disadvantages of not washing the rice also seem to be less pronounced with this variety. In this particular case you may prefer to forgo the texture benefits of washing and instead opt for the flavor benefits of not washing, as its wonderful flavor is, after all, the main reason you would be using Jasmine or Basmati rice in the first place. When you turn your Rice Cooker on, it will start doing its happy little thing cooking the rice and when it senses the water is gone it will just as happily turn itself off, click to warm, beep or anything else your rice cookers is designed to do while going into the warming mode. The untrained person might assume at this point that the rice is done and get it ready for eating, this is not the case. After cooking rice in a rice cooker, the rice should be allowed to rest in the warmcycle for at least five to ten minutes, to fully complete the cooking process and allow the water level to stabilize. During this warm-time, do not open the rice cooker. Just let it be. As with any other type of cooking, with rice there is always some degree of continuation after the heat has been removed, during this time the rice continues cooking ever so slowly. Generally, when the rice cooker initially stops or warms, there is still some moisture present in the rice. If you try to eat it now, you will have a very mushy, somewhat gummy consistency to the rice. Now, If you wait a few minutes, the excess water will slowly steam its way out of the rice, and the doneness of the rice will equalize between the inside and the outside of the grains, leading to a perfect texture all the way through. Please, keep the cover on during the warm-cycle. Try to open the rice cooker only as much as is absolutely necessary. Do not keep the lid off for long periods of time, and when you close it, be sure to close it firmly (don't leave it slightly ajar). Every second that you keep the lid open is a second of water vapor leaving your rice, and you will find that your rice will dry out quite fast. The other reason to keep the lid on until you're actually about to use it is if you immediately dump it all out into a bowl and leave it out to the open air, then keeping your cooker closed really won't help the rice anyway. In fact, most families take the rice cooker straight to the dinner table and serve out of it there. This is why the cookers usually come with handles.
About the Author: Bob Nielsen is co-owner of Rice Cookers Market, an on-line Retail Store
consisting of a variety of Rice Cookers and Food Steamers from several manufacturers. I invite you to visit us today at Rice Cookers Market and see how easy it is to save with a Rice Cooker.
Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Bob_Nielsen
==== ==== Having trouble cooking rice? Find out the best way to do it. http://reviewsofricecookers.org ==== ====