Perfect Instant Pot Basmati Rice Experiment
We conducted 5 tests with Indian basmati rice using different amounts of liquid, cooking time, and pressure release methods in our Instant Pot Electric Pressure Cooker. Find the full experiment details and results below the recipe.
Since were al dente fans, our perfect Indian basmati rice is Test 3s results fully cooked, firm with a bite, yet has a tint of softness. But if you prefer softer basmati rice, follow Test 5s ratios and pressure cooking methods.
- Softer Rice: If you enjoy softer rice, increase the liquid amount rather than cooking time.
- Rinsing the Rice: If youre rinsing the rice, itll throw off the rice-to-water ratio. So, be sure to reduce 3 tablespoons of water from the 1 cup of water stated in the recipe.
How To Make Rice
This easy and delicious boxed rice recipe requires 3 simple steps to prepare in the Instant Pot:
Get the full recipe and see the video prep below
Is Brown Rice Better Than White Rice
There is a big debate over which rice it better. All rice consists almost entirely of carbs, with small amounts of protein and practically no fat. Brown rice is a whole grain, which means it contains all parts of the grain including the fibrous bran, the nutritious germ and the carb-rich endosperm. Brown rice has more fiber and antioxidants, as well as a lot more important vitamins and minerals.
White rice has had the bran and germ removed, which are the most nutritious parts of the grain. This leaves white rice with very few essential nutrients, which is why brown rice is usually considered much healthier than white.
On the other hand, brown rice contains the anti-nutrient phytic acid which reduce our body’s ability to absorb certain nutrients such as iron and zinc. Brown rice may also contain higher amounts of arsenic, a toxic chemical. However this is only a concern if you eat a lot of rice.
With the above facts, I am not recommending either one is better. You make the choice! I prefer to include both brown and white rice in our diet.
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Key Steps For Rice In The Instant Pot
- Rinse the rice before cooking. Rinsing rice before cooking removes any dirt from processing, gets rid of starch that can make the rice sticky, and, Ive found, makes the rice taste better. According to Instant Pots manual, rinsing the rice also makes up for the small amount of moisture lost in evaporation during the cooking process.
- Use the right ratio of rice to water. Instant Pot suggests any rice can be cooked with a one-to-one rice-to-water ratio, but during testing, we found this wasnt universally true both among Instant Pot models and other multi-cookers. Use slightly more water when cooking brown rice and wild rice to prevent undercooking and scorching. Plus, its better to err on the side of more water, since most rice varieties can be drained if theres excess moisture.
- Pressure cook the rice on high. Lock the lid in place and set to cook at HIGH pressure for the following times:
- White rice : 5 minutes
- Long-grain brown rice: 10 minutes
- Wild rice: 15 minutes
The Rice Sticks To The Bottom Of The Inner Pot
Having shiny, slightly sweet, plump, and delicious Japanese rice is the true comfort and luxury for me, so I am willing to spend a little more to purchase short grain Japanese rice from Japan . When I heard from others about rice sticking to the pot, I determined that I would not cook my precious rice in the Instant Pot. Not one piece of rice would go to waste in my house.
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How To Make Rice In A Pressure Cooker
Here’s a faster and easier way to make white rice.
Want a fast way to make white rice that requires little attention and produces fluffy, separate grains every time? Use a pressure cooker. The interesting thing about cooking rice in a pressure cooker is that you need less water. In a traditional covered pot, water evaporates during the entire cooking time, so you need lots of water to compensate for that loss. In a pressure cooker, once the cooker has come up to pressure, it becomes a sealed environment that allows no further evaporation. So no matter how much rice you cook, you need to add only enough water to equal the volume of rice plus ¼ cup.
Heres how: Place 1 cup long-grain white, jasmine, or basmati rice in fine-mesh strainer and rinse under cold running water until water runs clear, then transfer rice to stovetop or electric pressure cooker and add 1¼ cups water and ½ teaspoon salt, if desired. For each additional cup rice, add only 1 cup water . Cook rice at high pressure for 3 minutes, then remove pressure cooker from heat or turn it off and let pressure release naturally for 10 minutes. Open pressure cooker, fluff rice with fork, and serve.
Why You Need To Rinse Rice:
- Starch: Rinsing your rice before cooking will help get rid of the extra starch which is found on Rice. This extra starch when cooked causes the rice to become sticky and gloopy. Rinsing will take off that extra starch and insure nice fluffy individual grains of rice.
- Impurities: No method of preparing rice for the store shelf is perfect. Rinsing your rice will also help get rid of any impurities, such as dirt, left over pesticides and help sanitize your rice making for a healthy meal.
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Should You Rinse The Rice
Rinsing your rice before cooking can help remove some of the excess starch. Some people believe this excess starch may lead to sticking and getting the dreaded BURN notice on the Instant Pot.
So, while this may seem like an unnecessary step that adds time and a dirty strainer, we highly recommend it! It will be worth it if you want your final product to be fluffy rather than gummy.
How To Cook A Small Amount Of Rice
If you need to cook less than 1 cup of dry rice, I recommend using the pot-in-pot cooking method. This means youll cook the rice in a separate bowl, lifted up on a trivet.
Check out my pot-in-pot cooking tutorial if you need extra guidance, but to cook the rice in a separate bowl, youll just need to add an extra cup of water to the bottom of the Instant Pot to get started. This water will boil andmake the pot come to pressure. Pour the rinsed rice and cooking water into the separate bowl, then set that bowl on a trivet situated over the water in the bottom of the Instant Pot.
For pot-in-pot cooking, youll need to select a bowl that is oven-safe and 7-inches or less in diameter when using a 6-quart Instant Pot.
Ive used porcelain salad bowls and glass mixing bowls with success, or you can use a stainless-steel baking pan, as long as it leaves space around the bowl for the pressure to build up.
With pot-in-pot cooking, the cooking time doesnt change for Instant Pot white rice, so it will be ready in the same amount of time as listed below. And as an added benefit, you wont have anything to clean on the bottom of your Instant Pot when youre done!
- 1cupwater
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How To Use Wild Rice
Once youve got wild rice cooked up perfectly in your Instant Pot, its a great staple to keep in the fridge and add to meals throughout the week!
- Love chicken and rice? Use wild rice instead!
- Do you add rice to soups? Add wild rice instead!
- Add it to burgers, meatloaf, or salmon patties.
- Mix in veggies and fermented soy sauce or coconut aminos, and youve got a wild rice stir-fry!
- Or my Creamy Wild Rice Soup!
Does Instant Pot Make Good Rice
Absolutely! We found it to be much better than stovetop because it absorbs the exact amount of water it needs. Even a novice cooker will be able to make the perfect fluffy rice in it.
When cooking the rice in the pressure cooker the main trick is to use the right amount of water. Generally, you need 1 cup of water for every cup of rice. The IP does the rest, and you are pretty much guaranteed to end up with the best-cooked rice.
On the other hand, when cooking it on the stovetop, you have to account for water evaporation, and you usually need more water. Therefore, this makes it more difficult to end up with perfectly-cooked rice.
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What Is Wild Rice
First, contrary to its name, wild rice isnt rice. Its an aquatic grass!
Its called rice because it looks and cooks like rice, but thats pretty much where their similarities end.
Wild rice is a pseudograin, meaning it looks, acts, cooks, and even tastes like a grain, except its not. Quinoa and amaranth are also pseudograins which are actually seeds!
Wild rice is the only rice native to North America. Only one other type of wild rice grows in the world in Asia where its eaten as a vegetable, not as a grain.
Wild rice is a healthy source of
- magnesium, folate, manganese, zinc, and iron
- B vitamins
- fiber
- antioxidants 30x more than white rice!
How Long Does White Rice Take In The Instant Pot
White rice cooks in just a 4 minute pressure cooking cycle. Keep in mind, that it typically takes up to 10 minutes for the Instant Pot to come to pressure, and youll wait another 10 minutes for the pressure to naturally release, so this could take 24 minutes in total but most of that time is completely hands off!
The benefit of cooking Instant Pot white rice is that you dont have to wait for water to come to a boil on the stove, and you dont have to watch the rice as it cooks to make sure it doesnt stick to the pot. If you forget about your rice while youre doing something else in the kitchen, it will still turn out perfectly because the Instant Pot switches to a keep warm setting when its done.
An electric pressure cooker is a busy persons best friend especially if you get distracted easily. It makes cooking rice fool-proof!
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Rice Cookers And The Instant Pot
When you cook white rice on the stove, the typical ratio is 1 part rice to 2 parts water. With rice cookers you don’t need to remember ratios at all. Just measure rice with the cooker’s cup accessory . Then fill the machine’s pot to a precalibrated water line to match your uncooked rice amount.
Rice cookers often have multiple water volume lines. The one you choose depends on the kind of rice you plan to make. Not so with an Instant Pot, which has just one series of suggested water volume lines that matches the water levels that standard rice cookers suggest for white rice. It also translates to a 1:1 ratio . Most importantly, the volume lines account for displacement caused by the volume of rice itself .
Instant Pot also recommends a 1:1 ratio for all grains of cooked rice. This included everything from brown to jasmine, basmati and wild rice. The only variable that changes is how long it should cook.
Soak Rice For 20 Minutes
I tried both soaking rice and skip soaking rice prior to cook rice in the Instant Pot. Whether its cooked in manual mode or Rice mode, when I didnt soak rice, it did not become tender all the way through.
This is probably the only difference between cooking other types of rice. I often get asked why we need to soak Japanese short grain rice. Unlike the other types of rice, Japanese short grain rice is plump, and it takes time for the moisture to go through. Therefore, we always soak the rice first, giving the dry rice a head start in absorbing moisture.
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How To Make Perfect Instant Pot White Rice
What is great about the Instant Pot is that it sint just a pressure cooker. Every Instant Pot model also includes a rice cooking function. It also makes it easy to make differing amounts of rice. In the InstaPot, you can often make a smaller amount than you could in most dedicated rice cookers. Simply use a water to rice ration of 1 cup rice to 1 cup of water.
The secret to fluffy rice that does not stick is to rinse it well before cooking. Immerse the rice in water, stir until the water turns milky, and drain. Repeat, and then run under water a bit longer to completely rinse. This removes the excess starch that can cause rice to get sticky.
Another tip is to add about 1 teaspoon of oil to the pot for each cup of rice. This also prevents sticking and reduces foam from the cooking rice. A bit of salt adds flavor. Use the Rice setting for white rice. For brown rice, use the high pressure cooking setting and cook for 22 minutes.
How To Cook Perfect Long Grain Rice In An Instant Pot
Rice is an amazing accompaniment to many different kinds of meals. Unfortunately, though, cooking rice properly can be time consuming and difficult. The good news? You can cook Perfect Long Grain Rice in an Instant Pot. Thats right. Rice in an Instant Pot.
White rice can be extremely fussy, even for the most seasoned of cooks. Finding that right balance between fluffy and over cooked can seem somewhat impossible. Enter the Instant Pot. This recipe guarantees that you will always have perfectly cooked, fluffy rice ready to serve as a side with your favorite recipes. Perfect long grain rice in an instant pot is the perfect accompaniment to your family meals.
In fact, if you want to change up the flavors of your rice, you can go ahead and add any herbs and spices you like to this recipe. Simply match the herbs and spices to the main dish you are cooking and in no time, you will have an amazing and delicious side dish for any meal.
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What Is The Best Rice To Water Ratio
Youll be surprised but it is always and for ALL sorts 1:1. Yes, you read that right.
Instant Pot Rice calls for a 1:1 rice to water ratio
You wonder why on the stove different ratios are called for. Well, the secret to rice cooking is that the darker or wilder the rice the longer it needs to cook and the longer something needs to cook, the more water evaporates during the process.
This leads us to the conclusion, that different kinds of rice do not necessarily need different kinds of amounts of water to cook but rather more water to evaporate.
Since the Instant Pot gives a tight seal and high pressure, no water evaporates at all.
So yes, brown rice and even wild rice need the exact same amount of water as white rice in an evaporation-proof environment. *mind-blown*
Serve Instant Pot Brown Rice
Finally, fluff the perfectly cooked brown rice with a rice paddle or fork.
*Pro Tip: If the rice is a bit wet, let it rest a bit for the moisture to escape before serving.
Enjoy your tasty & perfectly cooked pressure cooker brown rice~
*Leftover Rice Storage Tip: Let leftover brown rice cool completely before storing in the fridge.
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Making Smaller Individual Portions
If you want to cook an individual serving of ½ cup dried rice, use the pot-in-pot method. This is where you mix the rice with equal parts water, then steam it in a smaller pot that sits on top of a trivet with 1 cup of water in the larger insert. Pressure cook for 5 minutes instead of 3 minutes, and naturally-release for 10 minutes.
My Zojirushi Rice Cooker Does An Amazing Job
A rice cooker is an essential appliance at Japanese household. My Zojirushi Induction Heating Rice Cooker makes perfect rice every time, and I can even schedule the finished cooking time so the rice is always ready for dinner. Thats another reason why I didnt need my Instant Pot to cook rice for me.
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Failproof Instant Pot Rice
After weeks of experimenting, I got it right. Here is your fail-proof guide for Instant Pot Rice. White rice, brown rice, wild rice, and many more, basically an encyclopedia about cooking rice in a pressure cooker.
If youve followed along for a while, you know Im a huuuuge fan of pressure cooking. My Instant Pot Chicken and Rice recipe is not only a hit at my house but thousands of others now, too. YAY!
