Do You Wash Your Rice?

Well, I'm probably not the right person to give you absolutely "clear directions" on this matter, Chumly ... but this is what I do: with (more expensive) packaged rice, most of the time I don't bother to wash it at all. I just cook it as it comes. With the "loose" bulk varieties, I sift (for whatever else might be in there) & wash. To date, I haven't suffered any ill effects by doing things this way. And I eat a lot of rice. Love it!

With a very small brush, like for mascara.

We always wash our brown rice because we buy it in bulk or in 50 pound cloth bags and it often has a beetle or two in there. Not nice to find a beetle in your basmati.

http://british-chinese.blogspot.com/2008/06/rice-to-wash-or-not-to-wash.html

nice little blog...true or not - I dunno.

We wash our rice.
Well, truth be told, The Lovely Bride does.

no, i don't wash my rice.

I wash white rice but not brown rice.

I wash my rice in boiling hot water while cooking it.

If I found a nice boiled beetle in my rice, well so be it.

Next time we do some rice, Im going to wash it well and save the dripins on a filter paper.Then Ill weigh it and ash it and see how much talc or mineral stuff is in there by doing an EDAX on the resideue after ashing. If theres talc, Itll show up as a peak in the serpentine/asbestos minerals clans

I've used a white rice recipe from Florence Lin's 'Regional Chinese Cookbook' for years. It makes great rice with a combination of boiling/steaming. Notice that it uses less than the normal 1:2 ratio of rice:water.

2 cups white rice
3 cups cold water

add rice to dry pan. Rinse in cold water 2-3 times until rinse water no longer looks starchy. Add 3 cups cold water. Stir once. Bring to boil over high heat. Continue boiling uncovered over high heat without stirring until water boils off and steam vents appear in the top of the rice (takes about 5 mins). Turn off heat, cover, let sit for 12 minutes. Stir before serving.

That sounds pretty much how The Bride does it. But when adding water
before boiling, she puts her finger in, just touching the rice, and pours until
the water reaches "here" on her finger.

Yeah, I've seen the "first knuckle" recipe for rice:water ratio as well. I once did the 2:3 ratio and then stuck my finger into the pan and rested my fingertip on the top of the rice. The water came up to my first knuckle.

Kinda like a "rule of thumb"

I am kinda' wondering about the talc!



http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EDAX

First off, the rice you are suing is the rice I grew up on. Every meal. Serious.

Second, we always wash the extra talc off the rice. Makes it much more sticky and good!

I'm so happy. I found out my grocery carries Kokuho Rose the other day.

Yum yum yum

T
K
Oishi so!

Spiffy, I've tried a bunch of brands and this is the one I'm stuck on!

Nods with Diest - I haven't washed rice since I used to cook with CalRose, a japanese rice, decades ago. Just recently I bought a big bag (5 pounds; they didn't have a small bag) since I want to make stuffed tofu pockets.. so, I bet I wash it.
Adds, I've never bought rice in bulk. Not a lot of bulk bins in this neck of the woods.... Would that arborio came in bulk..

All the advice I've come across suggests risotto rices (like Aborio, Carnaroli, etc) shouldn't be washed before cooking, because it removes necessary starch, which acts as the "glue"(for want of a better word! ) in risotto dishes. What about the rest of you?

Never.