Rice can frequently be one of the trickier foodstuffs to prepare: added to the questions of what time and heat to cook rice at, is the difficulty of measuring a sufficient amount of water to add to the dish so that it is completely absorbed by the time of cooking. However, cooking rice can be made considerably easier by using a device known as rice cooker. Originating in Southeast Asia, rice cookers make preparing rice completely easy thanks to the innovative technology that can be applied to a wide range of dishes.
Rice Cooked to Perfection
Rice cookers take their inspiration from the simple yet effective rice steamers used in Asia for centuries. Essentially, they work by boiling or steaming the rice in water for a set period. The best rice cookers now have timer settings, and as long as the rice has been properly prepared in advance, the chef can walk away from it to prepare other food safe in the knowledge that the rice will be waiting for them cooked to perfection. Rice cookers heat the necessary amount of water with a heating element, letting it spread into the container. It leaves the rice much fluffier and less soggy than cooking it by conventional means i.e. by boiling it in a pan directly in contact with water.
A Wide Variety of Uses
That’s not all, however. Modern rice cookers are also designed with multi-purpose functionality in mind. They can be used to poach eggs to perfection, make oatmeal, and cook all sort of grains like buckwheat and quinoa. Even more complicated dishes like soups, frittatas, and humus can be knocked up on the fly with complete ease, as well as steamed meats or vegetables. To the uninitiated, rice cookers might seem like a gimmick and unnecessary indulgence, but once acquired, budding chefs will forget how they ever got by in the kitchen without one.
