Parboiled rice: what's it for, and how best to cook it?

March 1, 2015 8:12 AM

By mistake I bought a bag of parboiled white rice the other day instead of my usual basmati.

Cooked some last night for supper. It seemed to take about the same time to steam as regular white rice but the resulting texture was mushier.

What is this stuff intended for? It's not as if regular white rice takes hours to cook.

And can I cook it in a better way, or should I chuck it out?

posted by zadcat to Food & Drink (7 answers total)

You can use it to make plov or biryani. Parboiled rice supposedly can't be overcooked.
posted by pravit at 8:18 AM on March 1, 2015

Best answer: This seems pretty easily googleable. First hit. How to cook it.
posted by amro at 8:19 AM on March 1, 2015

Response by poster: Thank you, amro. I see I made an error by rinsing it.
posted by zadcat at 8:23 AM on March 1, 2015 [2 favorites]

It has a lower glycemic index than regular white rice, so it's great in that sense. Other than that I'm not sure it has any special extra usage. If you cook it properly you can do whatever with it that you'd do with regular rice but it does have a different texture/taste.
posted by hejrat at 9:54 AM on March 1, 2015

I'd make jambalaya or some other stew (or a soup) which essentially cooks the rice in the stew. It will take less time, and probably be a bit more bulletproof as far as the rice is concerned.
posted by Sunburnt at 11:39 AM on March 1, 2015

My ricecooker has a "quick cooking" setting that is perfect for parboiled rice.
posted by colin_l at 3:07 PM on March 1, 2015

Parboiled rice is the best! It has a lot of the nutritious value of brown rice, but with the taste, texture, and cooking time of white rice. In my experience, it's also less prone to mushiness than regular white rice (but this might also be a function of grain size; the parboiled rice I buy is long-grain). I've cooked it a few hundred times in a saucepan and literally never gotten bad results.

My standard way to cook parboiled rice:
1 cup rice, 2 cups water, pat of butter, Maggi bouillon cube, bay leaf. Bring to a boil then reduce to lowest heat and cover. Cook 20 minutes, turn the heat off, and let sit with cover for 5 more minutes. This is so good I sometimes eat it with no further accompaniment.

(Edited to add: by "pat of butter", if I'm honest, I mean "1-inch cube of butter".)
posted by aws17576 at 4:53 PM on March 1, 2015 [2 favorites]