But I digress, I remember when I was shopping for my rice cooker a few years ago, and I was seeing the ones that could do both pressurized and non-pressurized modes as they lead to different tastes.
I know at least in Korea, you can actually but replacement inner pots if you scratch your coating.
Not overly familiar with Korean brands! Japanese products like Zojirushi and Tiger were what I was personally introduced to on the high end (and of course, China produced tons of solid inexpensive ones).
Definitely note that this post isn't a product review. There are resources that specialize in that sort of thing, it's for sure out of our area of expertise :)
As an Instant Pot enthusiast, you can cook rice just as well as a rice cooker with enough experimentation with cooking times and water ratio. I got some cheap stainless serving bowls from IKEA which I use to wash, cook, and serve rice in the same vessel. I also got a mesh vegetable steamer to steam parboiled rice for fried rice. The only time I'll ever use my 3 cup Zojirushi rice cooker is if the Instant Pot is being used for something else.
Totally agree on all points. Upgrading from a cheapo $15 rice cooker to a Zoji radically upgraded my sushi rice game. Suddenly I can do hand rolls, nigiri, musubi in a snap. Incredible.
But regarding fried rice optionality - I fridge left over steamed rice, and when I want to make fried rice I just crush the cold rice blocks with my hands into discrete rice grains. They crumble rather easily. So when ready to stir fry one of my prepped bowls is just a bowl of loose cold leftover rice that I broke up. Easy peasy.
I grew up with a Zojirushi and my Taiwanese girlfriend has fully sold me on her hand-me-down Tatung. With so much Chinese cooking involving steaming, having an electric steamer is just a no-brainer. It makes steaming small things (including reheating) so much more convenient that I'm much more likely to pursue that option compared to alternatives. And the rice is fairly high quality despite being fast because it's actually a steamer.
One other thought in the apparently endless number of thoughts on rice cookers....
My Tiger is now is 24 years old. Single setting model; no squinting to read the LCD readouts. Still works fine and will probably continue to do so forever. For folks concerned with too much stuff going into landfills, cheap and simple Tiger is pretty nice.
One problem...24 years ago, nonstick coatings were not so good. There's been some flaking off of the nonstick. I might get a new Tiger just because I'm not interested in consuming nonstick coatings.
I’m Harrison, an ex fine dining industry line cook. My stack "The Secret Ingredient" adapts hit restaurant recipes (mostly NYC and L.A.) for easy home cooking.
I’ve owned a rice cooker most of my married life. We are on our 2nd Zojirushi and started with a little on/warm one when we first got married. I love the rice it makes and how I don’t have to watch it.
This is an impressive post! Thank you for the detailed description and recipes. I've made a few recipes in our rice cooker and am delighted to have some more to try. It's a Zojirushi that was a gift from my MIL, who always goes for top-of-the-line. Interesting point about using Quick vs. Standard mode if you want to make fried rice later. Good to know!
Love this! So comprehensive! One surprising use for us is to cook our steel cut oats in it every morning. We put the oats in the night before, set a timer, and warm/freshly cooked steel cut oatmeal in the morning!
*Pressure* IH. We have the previous version thanks to a really good sale a few years ago. It does make brown or multigrain rice faster, but you’re really getting into diminishing returns. The US model does have a steel cut oatmeal setting that works really well.
Haha. It’s Fairlane, come to razz you about my arthritis. Just kidding. I’ve always used the ATK method of making rice and it’s never failed me. Still. Chris makes a valid point that I’m just realizing now that if I had a small rice cooker it would free up a burner. I’ll have to come to terms with getting one. 🤣
I stopped trying to convince people to get a rice cooker 20 years ago. Until one owns a nice simple rice cooker, they'll insist for eternity that their way is just fine. I live in China, spend a lot of time in the countryside of west Hubei, a very poor region. Even the poorest of the poor peasant farmer has a rice cooker.
Do yourself a favor. Get a rice cooker. Chinese farmers will nod approval.
Haha. That’s great. It’s just me and my wife and we don’t eat that much rice but still, like Chris pointed out. Set it and forget it. You mentioned you have a Tiger brand. America’s Test Kitchen (it’s a well known company that tests cooking equipment and puts out tried and true recipes if you didn’t already know) reviewed a few rice cookers and Tiger didn’t fare very well. Zojirushi was the top brand but their rice cooker is $208 😂
That's the problem with online reviews. America's Test Kitchen is just another entity trying to grab a toehold. They're OK. They're sometimes not OK. It's an online review. People get dazzled by tools with lots of buttons and a thousand options. H Mart doesn't even sell Zoji or Tiger; they push Cuckoo and Koti. Who knew? They're decent cookers.
I'm a tool tech nerd. I go to where the people are that use the tools. I ask them. I rarely get into online commentary, but when tools are the topic, I gotta say something. Rice cookers are tools.
My old Chicago neighborhood is immediately adjacent to "North Chinatown" which is actually more Viet and Thai than Chinese, but I digress. The TaiNam Grocery in that 'hood is where big numbers of East Asia immigrants live. TaiNam only carries Tiger brand. Poor people know what works. In Wuhan, where I've been for about 15 years, Tiger is recognized as top brand. There's only about a hundred different brands of rice cookers here; it's nuts. We've gone through 2 Zoji's. I don't blame Zoji; modern mfg. can deliver a lemon from time to time. Shit happens.
But, push all that aside. Get a rice cooker. I don't care which one. Getting hung up on which one is missing the point. When I cook rice, which is just about every day, I often mix in a percentage of another grain. Quinoa, corn meal, buckwheat groats, whatever. Healthier and tastier than straight white rice. We also often put potato chunks in to cook with the rice; it's common in West Hubei...土豆米饭...potato rice. Sweet potato or Nangua is excellent cooked in with the rice.
We got a Cuckoo when the Zojirushi we'd bought in Singapore bit the dust, and it's been good so far. We probably eat more brown rice than anything else (if you are not a bread eater, it is very difficult to get enough fibre where we live) so we wanted one with that setting.
That's another thing I learned with the single setting Tiger; all the settings aren't necessary. I eat short grain brown rice all the time. I add slightly more water, but only slightly, run it through its usual 20 minute-ish cycle for white rice, keep the lid shut and let it steam for another 20-25 minutes and it's perfect every time. In central China, we also get red rice, purple rice, and other "heirloom" rice that's not considered heirloom here; it's just red rice.
But, good for you. Rice is nice. Westerners with their aversion to getting a rice cooker and insisting that their dipshit way of cooking it on the stovetop is just fine...I don't get it.
Yeah, I think in the western tradition this tends to be our general approach. With regards to rice, Europe tends to borrow a good bit from the Middle East, which in turn shares a lot of philosophical similarities with India. The grains should be loose, dry, and fluffy.
For many western home cooks, if they’re struggling with rice, I think the path of least resistance would simply be to grab some Basmati and cook in the Indian style.
When you’re eating rice with chopsticks however, “loose and dry” is a pain in the ass to eat. You want the rice to be soft and sticky, but not mushy. Just think how impossible, say, sushi rolls would be with rice prepared in the pilaf method!
During COVID when things were very bleak I often made rice in my cooker, then cracked an egg on top when I fluffed it and let it all steam for a couple minutes. Then I’d toss on whatever raw vegetable I had and drizzle some soy sauce or Lao gan ma and call it a meal. It was comforting and good!
We have the aroma cooker linked, and it’s completely adequate. The only thing I’d mention to someone contemplating buying a rice cooker is to go for the stainless steel version. The nonstick is easier to clean for the first few uses, but then it’s just disposable. Our current stainless one has lasted forever!
France here. Cooking is my passion, world kitchen is my love. After 6 decades of cooking and steaming (and ultimately nuking) rice of all sorts I let myself talk into getting a rice cooker, medium range. I have tried it around 15 times, varying all the parameters, but I always wind up with mushy, sticky shit that I can only use to freeze in case someone gets the runnies. Not my bowl of rice, these thingies.
I bought one for 34 €, with a steaming basket. It only has two options: on and off 🤣. Works perfectly well.
No love for the Korean brands? Haha
But I digress, I remember when I was shopping for my rice cooker a few years ago, and I was seeing the ones that could do both pressurized and non-pressurized modes as they lead to different tastes.
I know at least in Korea, you can actually but replacement inner pots if you scratch your coating.
Not overly familiar with Korean brands! Japanese products like Zojirushi and Tiger were what I was personally introduced to on the high end (and of course, China produced tons of solid inexpensive ones).
Definitely note that this post isn't a product review. There are resources that specialize in that sort of thing, it's for sure out of our area of expertise :)
As an Instant Pot enthusiast, you can cook rice just as well as a rice cooker with enough experimentation with cooking times and water ratio. I got some cheap stainless serving bowls from IKEA which I use to wash, cook, and serve rice in the same vessel. I also got a mesh vegetable steamer to steam parboiled rice for fried rice. The only time I'll ever use my 3 cup Zojirushi rice cooker is if the Instant Pot is being used for something else.
Totally agree on all points. Upgrading from a cheapo $15 rice cooker to a Zoji radically upgraded my sushi rice game. Suddenly I can do hand rolls, nigiri, musubi in a snap. Incredible.
But regarding fried rice optionality - I fridge left over steamed rice, and when I want to make fried rice I just crush the cold rice blocks with my hands into discrete rice grains. They crumble rather easily. So when ready to stir fry one of my prepped bowls is just a bowl of loose cold leftover rice that I broke up. Easy peasy.
Fried rice using yesterday's lunch rice is definitely right. Wang Gang says so too.
Have you ever tried a Taiwanese style steamer like a Tatung? It seems like an interesting different style that boils + steams.
I grew up with a Zojirushi and my Taiwanese girlfriend has fully sold me on her hand-me-down Tatung. With so much Chinese cooking involving steaming, having an electric steamer is just a no-brainer. It makes steaming small things (including reheating) so much more convenient that I'm much more likely to pursue that option compared to alternatives. And the rice is fairly high quality despite being fast because it's actually a steamer.
I had a similar question. I got a tatung a while ago and I've been loving it, but I don't exactly have much to compare it to.
Also, do you have any tips of converting online rice cooker recipes to work for tatung?
Never used a Tatung :) Hopefully someone here can point you in the right direction?
One other thought in the apparently endless number of thoughts on rice cookers....
My Tiger is now is 24 years old. Single setting model; no squinting to read the LCD readouts. Still works fine and will probably continue to do so forever. For folks concerned with too much stuff going into landfills, cheap and simple Tiger is pretty nice.
One problem...24 years ago, nonstick coatings were not so good. There's been some flaking off of the nonstick. I might get a new Tiger just because I'm not interested in consuming nonstick coatings.
Love this rice deep dive!
I’m Harrison, an ex fine dining industry line cook. My stack "The Secret Ingredient" adapts hit restaurant recipes (mostly NYC and L.A.) for easy home cooking.
check us out:
https://thesecretingredient.substack.com
I’ve owned a rice cooker most of my married life. We are on our 2nd Zojirushi and started with a little on/warm one when we first got married. I love the rice it makes and how I don’t have to watch it.
This is an impressive post! Thank you for the detailed description and recipes. I've made a few recipes in our rice cooker and am delighted to have some more to try. It's a Zojirushi that was a gift from my MIL, who always goes for top-of-the-line. Interesting point about using Quick vs. Standard mode if you want to make fried rice later. Good to know!
Love this! So comprehensive! One surprising use for us is to cook our steel cut oats in it every morning. We put the oats in the night before, set a timer, and warm/freshly cooked steel cut oatmeal in the morning!
You missed the *most* expensive Zo: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B09N9Z183T
*Pressure* IH. We have the previous version thanks to a really good sale a few years ago. It does make brown or multigrain rice faster, but you’re really getting into diminishing returns. The US model does have a steel cut oatmeal setting that works really well.
Cool video here of how they’re made: https://youtu.be/xLCwr8qG1p4
Haha. It’s Fairlane, come to razz you about my arthritis. Just kidding. I’ve always used the ATK method of making rice and it’s never failed me. Still. Chris makes a valid point that I’m just realizing now that if I had a small rice cooker it would free up a burner. I’ll have to come to terms with getting one. 🤣
I stopped trying to convince people to get a rice cooker 20 years ago. Until one owns a nice simple rice cooker, they'll insist for eternity that their way is just fine. I live in China, spend a lot of time in the countryside of west Hubei, a very poor region. Even the poorest of the poor peasant farmer has a rice cooker.
Do yourself a favor. Get a rice cooker. Chinese farmers will nod approval.
Haha. That’s great. It’s just me and my wife and we don’t eat that much rice but still, like Chris pointed out. Set it and forget it. You mentioned you have a Tiger brand. America’s Test Kitchen (it’s a well known company that tests cooking equipment and puts out tried and true recipes if you didn’t already know) reviewed a few rice cookers and Tiger didn’t fare very well. Zojirushi was the top brand but their rice cooker is $208 😂
That's the problem with online reviews. America's Test Kitchen is just another entity trying to grab a toehold. They're OK. They're sometimes not OK. It's an online review. People get dazzled by tools with lots of buttons and a thousand options. H Mart doesn't even sell Zoji or Tiger; they push Cuckoo and Koti. Who knew? They're decent cookers.
I'm a tool tech nerd. I go to where the people are that use the tools. I ask them. I rarely get into online commentary, but when tools are the topic, I gotta say something. Rice cookers are tools.
My old Chicago neighborhood is immediately adjacent to "North Chinatown" which is actually more Viet and Thai than Chinese, but I digress. The TaiNam Grocery in that 'hood is where big numbers of East Asia immigrants live. TaiNam only carries Tiger brand. Poor people know what works. In Wuhan, where I've been for about 15 years, Tiger is recognized as top brand. There's only about a hundred different brands of rice cookers here; it's nuts. We've gone through 2 Zoji's. I don't blame Zoji; modern mfg. can deliver a lemon from time to time. Shit happens.
But, push all that aside. Get a rice cooker. I don't care which one. Getting hung up on which one is missing the point. When I cook rice, which is just about every day, I often mix in a percentage of another grain. Quinoa, corn meal, buckwheat groats, whatever. Healthier and tastier than straight white rice. We also often put potato chunks in to cook with the rice; it's common in West Hubei...土豆米饭...potato rice. Sweet potato or Nangua is excellent cooked in with the rice.
We got a Cuckoo when the Zojirushi we'd bought in Singapore bit the dust, and it's been good so far. We probably eat more brown rice than anything else (if you are not a bread eater, it is very difficult to get enough fibre where we live) so we wanted one with that setting.
That's another thing I learned with the single setting Tiger; all the settings aren't necessary. I eat short grain brown rice all the time. I add slightly more water, but only slightly, run it through its usual 20 minute-ish cycle for white rice, keep the lid shut and let it steam for another 20-25 minutes and it's perfect every time. In central China, we also get red rice, purple rice, and other "heirloom" rice that's not considered heirloom here; it's just red rice.
But, good for you. Rice is nice. Westerners with their aversion to getting a rice cooker and insisting that their dipshit way of cooking it on the stovetop is just fine...I don't get it.
For me as a Hispanic cook the question isn’t “why would I want rice to be sticky”
It’s that we (at least where I’m from) spend a great deal of effort in making sure that rice is absolutely minimally sticky
The rice is fried in oil until toasted before the water is added to boil to accomplish this.
Yeah, I think in the western tradition this tends to be our general approach. With regards to rice, Europe tends to borrow a good bit from the Middle East, which in turn shares a lot of philosophical similarities with India. The grains should be loose, dry, and fluffy.
For many western home cooks, if they’re struggling with rice, I think the path of least resistance would simply be to grab some Basmati and cook in the Indian style.
When you’re eating rice with chopsticks however, “loose and dry” is a pain in the ass to eat. You want the rice to be soft and sticky, but not mushy. Just think how impossible, say, sushi rolls would be with rice prepared in the pilaf method!
Yeah, no doubt, I agree with all this. Just wanted to offer a comment. Love your work.
During COVID when things were very bleak I often made rice in my cooker, then cracked an egg on top when I fluffed it and let it all steam for a couple minutes. Then I’d toss on whatever raw vegetable I had and drizzle some soy sauce or Lao gan ma and call it a meal. It was comforting and good!
We have the aroma cooker linked, and it’s completely adequate. The only thing I’d mention to someone contemplating buying a rice cooker is to go for the stainless steel version. The nonstick is easier to clean for the first few uses, but then it’s just disposable. Our current stainless one has lasted forever!
France here. Cooking is my passion, world kitchen is my love. After 6 decades of cooking and steaming (and ultimately nuking) rice of all sorts I let myself talk into getting a rice cooker, medium range. I have tried it around 15 times, varying all the parameters, but I always wind up with mushy, sticky shit that I can only use to freeze in case someone gets the runnies. Not my bowl of rice, these thingies.
At least here in Australia, every now and then Aldi sells a Zojirushi knock off for about $60, and they are great.