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Party In My Tummy: How to Make Rice, Unorthodox-ily

by | Food, Uncategorized

Hi friends!  How are you liking the Party In My Tummy series so far?  I hope you’ve tried some of the tips I’ve shared, with great success!  If you’ve missed a post, click here to see the full schedule.  And I’d love it if you shared this series with your friends as well!

You know how you hear that brown rice is better for you?  I say kabosh.  I love my rice, and I like it white.  People all over the world have been surviving on rice for thousands of years, so it can’t be all bad, but then again, I’m a pasta/carb fiend, so maybe I’m a little biased…just a teensy bit.

One Dog Woof: How to Make Rice

Let’s see, I learned how to make rice in a rice cooker, using one particular inner pot.  That was the problem with my rice making, I could only do it with that one pot.  Then that pot got a hole in it.  Yup, a hole.  I have no idea how that happened, but I was really up a creek and out of luck at that point.  How does one actually make rice without my special pot with the correct line markers in it?!

One Dog Woof: How to Make Rice

I’ve heard ratios of 2 cups water to 1 cup rice, but I rinse my rice before cooking, and there’s no way you get all that water out, so “2 cups” becomes “2 cups minus whatever is in the pot”.  Don’t you love recipes?

So here’s my unorthodox way of making rice.  This way of measuring works for any amount of rice (within reason), in my rice cooker or in a pot.  I do have to credit my dad for this, since he did show me this once upon a time, but I had forgotten about it until I was pot-less and craving rice..

Start with rice in a pot big enough to fit your hand, sorta.  I use 2 measuring cups of rice…not 2 cups, 2 glass measuring cups filled to the brim.  Rinse until the water runs somewhat clear (to be honest, I get pretty lazy about this step, I just rinse a couple of times, clear or not).

One Dog Woof: How to Make Rice

Then (and here’s the “totally sounds ridiculous” part), add enough water to the pot so that it comes almost up to your wrist when you put your hand in flat – about 1 inch away from the crease of your wrist.  Crazy right?  But it works, and my dad’s hand is bigger and it worked for him too.  I could probably figure out why it works, using words like volume and displacement, but I really don’t want to right now.

One Dog Woof: How to Make Rice

Put your pot on the stove, covered, on medium high heat and bring to a boil.  I happen to have glass lids, so you can see what’s going on.  The water boils and the bubbles pretty much want to overflow the pot.  Turn the heat down to low at this point so you don’t make a mess all over your stove and have an angry husband yell at you about making a mess on your stove.

One Dog Woof: How to Make Rice

Cook the rice on low heat for (I timed mine) ~7 minutes.  You’ll notice in the pictures that the bubbles will recede, and the rice is sort of just simmering in there with a lot of moisture.  Then after 7 minutes, or 5 or whatever works for you, turn the heat off completely.  At this point, the rice is no longer sitting in moisture, but it’s probably still a bit mushy.

One Dog Woof: How to Make Rice

This is somewhere in the 4 minute range.

One Dog Woof: How to Make Rice

This is when I turned the heat off.  You can see there’s no more bubbles (sorry for the terrible picture).

Leave the rice on the stove, heat off, and finish the rest of your cooking.  By the time you get to it, in another 10 or 15 minutes, it’ll be done.  Not overly mushy, not burnt.  Fluffy, with a bit of sheen to each individual kernel.

One Dog Woof: How to Make Rice

This is when the lid came off.

One Dog Woof: How to Make Rice

(And now you can see the difference in lighting between my kitchen and pretty much everywhere else in my house!)

One Dog Woof: How to Make Rice

If you give this a try, let me know how it goes!  I know it works for me, but really, I’ve never told anyone how I do this, so I have no idea if it would work for anyone else.  But I did this for the post, and the rice came out perfectly.  I see some fried rice goodness in my future!

I hope you all have a great week!  I have a fantastic guest poster coming up on Tuesday, and don’t forget, there will be a link party on June 20th, so get cooking!

See more great cooking tips here!

7 Comments

  1. Ellie

    Nice justification on why white rice is good for you! I’ll have to use that one. 🙂 My MIL taught me to cover the uncooked rice with enough water that you could stick your thumb in up to the knuckle. It works for me!

  2. Chiwei @ One Dog Woof

    I’ve heard that too, to stick a finger in and have the water come up to the knuckle. I haven’t tried that, but will give it a shot!

  3. Kristin

    I’ve heard the knuckle rule too. I’ll have to try this though. Your rice looks so fluffy =)

  4. Kirsten

    Growing up, we had rice for pretty much every meal, and my dad used a rice cooker. I haven’t been able to find a rice cooker like his that works quite as well. I use the knuckle method now, which works just fine, but the rice ends up being a little drier than my dad’s. I’m excited to give your method a shot! Thank you for sharing!

  5. Lori@thestonybrookhouse

    Definitely going to try this! I’m so tired of messes on my stove and in my microwave!

  6. jd

    your method works all over the rice-eating world! my husband is a south indian, so we eat white rice every single day. my kids (now grown) are addicted to it, too. one trick for fluffy rice with each kernel distinct – use extra long grain white rice AND a splash of lemon juice. doesn’t affect the flavor but keeps each kernel perfect. of course, will not give you sticky rice if that’s what you like!

    jd in st louis

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