Many rice cookers on the market have an option to automatically start at a later time. I’m thinking of getting one so that I can have fresh rice when I come home after work. But this means (I assume) that the rice will be sitting in the water all day. I’ve heard that rice cookers make great rice, but will sitting in the water all day make the rice mushy?
Not that I’ve ever noticed, although my rice cooker is one of those spiffy fuzzy-logic models. I suspect that it tracks the amount of time the rice has been soaking and adjusts the cooking time accordingly. I haven’t ever done it for more than about 3-4 hours though.
I’m not sure how a timer feature would work on the on/off variety of rice cooker; seems like they might very easily overcook the rice.
Not mushy, but soft. For best results, you should soak the rice for about 30 to 60 minutes depending on the temperature of the water. The only time to soak rice for hours at a time is when you’re cooking brown rice.
I forgot to turn the rice cooker from “warm” to “cook”, and that surely made mushy rice.
:rolleyes:
Is it possible to have the rice in some sort of basket above the water so that it remains dry and then the steam will cook it?
Depends on your rice cooker, of course - but yes, I have a food steamer that has a rice basket that allows you to steam the rice. Takes a lot longer to cook that way (60 mins’ish" vs 15 mins for white rice), but if you have it on a timer that is not an issue.
ETA: Whoops - just realized it still has to sit in some water all day.
Not in my experience, and I’ve used the delay feature on mine (an Aroma) several times.
We use the delay feature for 10 hours. I’ve never noticed anything mushy about the rice.
Cooking rice without it touching water? I don’t think that’s possible.
But it is very Zen.
