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dino.
Mar 28, 2010

Yip Yip, bitch.

ntan1 posted:

What is your favorite species of Japanese rice that isn't koshihikari?

Milky Queen.

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dino.
Mar 28, 2010

Yip Yip, bitch.

PurpleXVI posted:

...I mean, okay, theoretically, let's say a rice weevil gets into my rice, and I boil it along with the rice, and eat it without noticing. Is that just going to be a real gross thing if I DO notice or are they potentially dangerous in some way to eat?

Because I'd say the big difference is that soup left out overnight can absolutely gently caress you up and maybe loving kill you if you get real unlucky.

Also I do live in Denmark. We get some proper winters from time to time.

I promise you, I'm not here to tell you how to live your life. Do what you wish, and that's on you. If you haven't had issues thus far, it's likely because the Danish import laws are such that pest mitigation is stricter than the US ones.

Here's a fun story. With any major food manufacturing, there's a series of procedures that you follow, called Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Points (HACCP). How it works is that you think logically about your manufacturing, shipping, and other such situations, and figure out what are the points along the way where you could harm someone if things go to hell. For example, in any food manufacturing facility, anyone entering the places where the food itself is being handled, people have to wash their hands, put on a hair net or other hair covering, throw on a disposable smock over their clothes, wear little booties over their shoes, put on a pair of gloves, and pass through a forced air machine. Why? Because any crap you have on you could potentially enter the food stream, and harm someone. Rather than take that risk, it's easier to prevent it, so that the food you eat is safe.

Part of the HACCP procedure is identifying the consequences of what happens in case a particular risk isn't mitigated successfully. For example, all food manufacturing has to have a glass and brittle plastic policy, because if glass or brittle plastic ends up in the food, the customer could choke on it or otherwise be seriously harmed by it. The thing with dry (as opposed to frozen cooked or ready to eat) rice is that most of our HACCP is involved with bog standard food facility stuff. Almost none of our processes have to worry about pathogens, because the moisture content of the rice is low enough that it's rare in the extreme that anything can grow on it. And, even if something DOES grow on it, the kill step is performed by the consumer. What's a kill step? In food manufacturing, before something is considered safe to eat, you have to put it through a kill step, to kill off any pathogens that may be on the food. What's a very effective kill step? Cooking the absolute heck out of something. Rice goes through a kill step when you cook it.

Here's a very cool article about kill steps:

https://www.fdareader.com/blog/2017/07/25/on-the-kill-step-and-leftovers

Long story longer, the weevils won't harm you. Bonus points if you wash your rice before eating (which you should be doing anyways).

Doom Rooster posted:

dino., what is the best rice, and why is it Sona Masoori?

Those are fighting words, especially to a guy from Tamil Nadu. We rep Ponni rice, and we rep it HARD.

Inceltown posted:

Thanks for all the words on this Dino. Only checked the thread out because you always make good posts and figured "well I eat rice, maybe I'll learn something interesting". Sure glad I did because this is fascinating.

This is the kindest thing someone has said to me in a very long time. You know me as some Internet weirdo, but you enjoy the content of what I write, and you told me that you do. From the 10 year old me, who sat by himself at lunch and had no friends because I was interested in reading books instead of playing sports, thank you for sending kindness my way. I appreciate your letting me know that you like my posts. <3

quote="Inceltown" post="537210099"]Not going to fault a South East Asian farmer for not trusting Monsanto near their land.
[/quote]

Oh, I'm talking that they distrust any pesticides at all, because so many different countries have banned so many different pesticides. It makes it easier for the Thai government to heavily restrict the use of pesticides, ban the most commonly banned ones from the countries they export to, and in general just keep things safer for their own population. This is on a country level, not an individual farmer level. It's not to say that Thailand is some glorious paradise, but their government is pretty strict on what can and can't be used in agriculture. For example, the FDA banned the use of isoprothiolane. Thailand banned it almost immediately, because the FDA has a zero tolerance policy for isoprothiolane.

Thailand has such a good reputation for their agriculture that the vast majority of their imports get hand waved through FDA, Customs and Border Patrol, and USDA. As long as they pass scrutiny of documents inspection, they're usually allowed through with very little fuss. In fact, most of my Thai containers clear customs and FDA a few days before the ocean vessel lands in the USA. India, on the other hand, has a serious issue because of the corruption that runs rampant there. You have to have all your containers go through customs exam at a customs exam warehouse, and it's freakishly expensive to do so.

Visions of Valerie posted:

That's a bit reductive, and ignores what the goals were beyond what became codified into USDA rules. That e.g. copper sulphate (note: a synthetic) is permitted is one of the reasons I and others wish the standards were stricter. Note also in both production methods that just because something safer/less damaging can be used doesn't mean that it is used. There remains no way to know for sure without knowing the farmer.

e: There's a labor issue here too - as a worker, what poo poo I inhale/get on my skin matters to me, even if it doesn't appear in the final product.

Be that as it may, this IS the issue we're dealing with right now. Organic doesn't mean what people think it means, and I wish more people knew that. Whatever the goals were, it's become what it is due to capitalism. People know that they can put a significant upcharge on organic food, because they know that the consumer is willing to pay for it due to fear mongering about chemicals, GMO, etc. It's the same issue that I have with terms like "Free Range" or "Natural". They're not regulated well enough to be meaningful, and slapping those labels onto food means that they can charge a butt-ton more money for it. It's much like "non GMO". There are several crops that have no GMO equivalents (Basmati rice is one such example). However, without the certification, we can't say it's non GMO, because the certifiers would get butthurt and sue. So I get phone calls every few days from panicked Brenda asking if the Basmati they bought from Patel Brothers or whatever has scary horrible GMO and I don't want little Paxtynn to die because he ate lunch at the brown people's house.

The premium labels are loving annoying, and I'll consistently roll my eyes at the insistence that they be on the food. If you want stuff that's grown like if it's in your home garden, go seek out local farmers who do it, and pay the higher prices that they command so that you can support local businesses as much as possible. There's a ton of farmers out there doing really cool work, and they're passionate about what they do. They grow weird heritage varieties of food, because nobody else cares about those weird things.

Hyperlynx posted:

Hm. I've just been keeping my rice in the sack. Maybe time to upgrade to a sack-sized hard plastic container...

How likely are bugs in an apartment nine storeys up, though?

So here's the issue. The bugs' eggs are already in the rice by the time it gets to your pantry. Also, they're all over the place. Regardless of how high your apartment is, bugs can get there. Also, in the case of pantry moths, they can literally fly. Whenever you bring rice home, throw it in the freezer for a minimum of 3 days to kill off whatever is in there, and then toss it in an airtight container.

uber_stoat posted:

bugs are good at hitching rides to places they want to be. also if you're unlucky they might already be in your food when you buy it. put it in the freezer and then put it into the plastic tub.

All of this.


Earwicker posted:

that depends on where you live. i lived in several large buildings in nyc that had all kinds of bugs living in the walls. mice too, they can chew through a sack. i've never had them go after rice tho.

#same

therattle posted:

Yeah. Sometimes (often) they are in the food and a sealed container is as much to keep them in and preventing them from spreading as it is to keep them out.

This guy knows from bugs. <3

MadFriarAvelyn posted:

All of this talk about pests in rice got me to panic and throw the bag of golden sella I bought in some glass jars and chuck em in the freezer.

Can you wash and cook rice straight from frozen or would that negatively affect the texture? Or do I just take the jars back out of the freezer after a week or so and all is well?

Here's the funny thing. Golden sella (parboiled rice that's yellow in colour) will tend to not get as much infestation as raw white rice. Apparently the bugs don't like the taste quite as much! You CAN get bugs in there, but in the years I've worked in this business, I have yet to get reports of golden sella getting infestation. Throw it in the freezer for 3 days to get rid of any hitchhiker bugs that got in there, and then transfer to an airtight container. No need to leave it in the freezer! And yes, you can indeed wash and cook rice from the freezer. There's such a small amount of moisture in there that it's not gonna affect the end product if it's kept frozen. Also, I hope you're soaking your sella rice? It needs like an hour to soak for it to come out the best.

uber_stoat posted:

my understanding is you don't have to leave it in the freezer. you cool it down for a while to kill any live ones and any eggs that might be inside, then you put it into a container outside the freezer. then it will be happy sitting on your pantry shelf with only the ghosts of weevils to haunt you.

Yes, all of this.

buglord posted:

Buddy I don’t know what compels you to write thousands of words about rice on your off time but I’m so glad you do.

e: this is sincere, btw

You know when you have a thing that you love very much? And you want to share it with others? And most of the population doesn't actually care about your passions, and generally tells you to shut up and take a seat? When you find people who are interested in that thing that you love, you want to make them excited about it too. You want to show them what makes that thing so fascinating. What makes it so much fun to talk about.

What spawned this thread was that I kept getting oddly specific questions about rice and its production. I was visiting Wroughtirony's and her parents at their house in Maine. We were doing early Xmas. During our hangout, Wroughtirony was like, "Dino, people keep asking about rice on the discord and the Goons with Spoons forum. Goddamned make a thread about rice. I promise you people will want to know about it." So then I did when I got home and had some spare time.

I genuinely love rice, and will talk about it all the time to anyone who will listen. I also love shipping logistics. I find it fascinating. Combine the two, and I've got my absolute dream job!

david_a
Apr 24, 2010




Megamarm
Threads like this are what makes SA special. People who know a lot about stuff that :justpost:

Doom Rooster
Sep 3, 2008

Pillbug

dino. posted:


Those are fighting words, especially to a guy from Tamil Nadu. We rep Ponni rice, and we rep it HARD


I went out and got some Ponni to make pongal after your post about it. It was delicious, and we’ll probably be making it every month for the foreseeable future.

What else should I do with the Ponni?

dino.
Mar 28, 2010

Yip Yip, bitch.

Doom Rooster posted:

I went out and got some Ponni to make pongal after your post about it. It was delicious, and we’ll probably be making it every month for the foreseeable future.

What else should I do with the Ponni?

Ok don’t laugh, but it hella works for stir fry if you use the the “proper” ratio of water to rice. So in the rice cooker, it’s however many rice cooker cups, and then fill to the exact fill line for those cups of rice. Ponni is made to absorb way way more water than most, which is why so many people love it. It’s economical to have a rice that you can cook with 3 parts water to 1 part rice and it still comes out fine.

Hyperlynx
Sep 13, 2015

dino. posted:

So here's the issue. The bugs' eggs are already in the rice by the time it gets to your pantry. Also, they're all over the place. Regardless of how high your apartment is, bugs can get there. Also, in the case of pantry moths, they can literally fly. Whenever you bring rice home, throw it in the freezer for a minimum of 3 days to kill off whatever is in there, and then toss it in an airtight container.
My freezer isn't big enough :(

Airtight plastic container it is, so at least I'm only eating the bugs (that don't get rinsed off) instead of letting them spread. Though your comments about the quality of Thai rice make me hopeful that it hasn't been an issue. I buy Royal Umbrella Jasmine rice.

edit: on the other hand, maybe I don't actually have to buy the 10kg sack every time...

edit edit: also, I'm in Australia, which I'm under the impression has pretty strict quarantine procedures for imports. (Well, or maybe that's just Western Australia). Has that been the case in your experience? (Well, assuming you send rice here).

Hyperlynx fucked around with this message at 03:51 on Jan 20, 2024

Discendo Vox
Mar 21, 2013

This does not make sense when, again, aggregate indicia also indicate improvements. The belief that things are worse is false. It remains false.
I appreciate your well-informed posts on FDA and NOP regulatory; as you indicate, rice has fewer issues than a lot of other commodities, and yeah, organic's an incredible shitpile of bad underlying science.

Discendo Vox fucked around with this message at 11:35 on Jan 20, 2024

PurpleXVI
Oct 30, 2011

Spewing insults, pissing off all your neighbors, betraying your allies, backing out of treaties and accords, and generally screwing over the global environment?
ALL PART OF MY BRILLIANT STRATEGY!

dino. posted:

Long story longer, the weevils won't harm you. Bonus points if you wash your rice before eating (which you should be doing anyways).

I consider the health reasons to wash rice somewhat eye-rolly, worries about heavy metals and such, at least in a place where food safety is as strictly regulated as in the EU in general(and Denmark in particular), but I do find that a quick wash(literally just put it in sieve and give it a quick splash under the faucet for ten seconds) tends to give the rice a nicer texture. Looks like what we get at our local store is a mixture of Indian and Pakistani imports repackaged(cleaned?) in Poland.

Also, genuinely, very interesting posts. I love to learn more about all these processes and the thought that goes into them, and logistics is just a fascinating topic by itself.

PokeJoe
Aug 24, 2004

hail cgatan


I always wash my rice. Why? Because I'm on a strictly clean diet

Coasterphreak
May 29, 2007
I like cookies.

PokeJoe posted:

I always wash my rice. Why? Because I'm on a strictly clean diet

Uncle Roger say you need better rice joke

(good thread, dino)

pyknosis
Nov 23, 2007

Young Orc
do you still need to wash your rice if you're gonna eat it raw

Squashy Nipples
Aug 18, 2007

I'm an rear end in a top hat, and I lost the magic measuring cup for my 2 quart Aroma rice cooker.

What are the actual measurements?

mystes
May 31, 2006

Squashy Nipples posted:

I'm an rear end in a top hat, and I lost the magic measuring cup for my 2 quart Aroma rice cooker.

What are the actual measurements?
180ml but you can just use 3/4 cup which is 177ml

mawarannahr
May 21, 2019

Squashy Nipples posted:

I'm an rear end in a top hat, and I lost the magic measuring cup for my 2 quart Aroma rice cooker.

What are the actual measurements?

180 ml for most I think

bloody ghost titty
Oct 23, 2008
I went and got five# calrose for my daily and sone sooni for my south Asian dishes, thanks Dino for sharing a bunch of stuff I couldn’t parse out from various blogs!

Stoca Zola
Jun 28, 2008

Thanks to this thread I remembered the sack of rice that my partner’s lovely Sikh coworker gave him when they were leaving town and didn’t want to have to lug with them. I think it’s in the top of my pantry still in the sack, I want to get it down and see what kind it is and if it is still ok. We are in a dry climate but I have no idea how old this rice is or the status of any possible pests. Is there a point where you should just give up on poorly cared for rice?

mobby_6kl
Aug 9, 2009

by Fluffdaddy
That's an awesome thread and I'm sad I only noticed it it today for the first time. I usually use jasmine rice for everyday cooking as there's a big market nearby and I can get huge sacks at good prices directly from the Vietnamese sellers which is pretty nice.

What kind of rice would be best for Central-Asian type of pilaf though? I think I tried making this Uzbek plov with Basmati rice as that's what the limited specific information I could find seems to recommend. But I wonder if there are some pro-tips for this type of dishes (not my photo)

VictualSquid
Feb 29, 2012

Gently enveloping the target with indiscriminate love.

mobby_6kl posted:

That's an awesome thread and I'm sad I only noticed it it today for the first time. I usually use jasmine rice for everyday cooking as there's a big market nearby and I can get huge sacks at good prices directly from the Vietnamese sellers which is pretty nice.

What kind of rice would be best for Central-Asian type of pilaf though? I think I tried making this Uzbek plov with Basmati rice as that's what the limited specific information I could find seems to recommend. But I wonder if there are some pro-tips for this type of dishes (not my photo)


Parboiled rice works very well for pilavs it is what I use most of the time. Or Turkish rice, if I get some on sale. Also if you feel fancy do that trick where you replace around 1/10th of the rice with orzo pasta for contrast.

Planet X
Dec 10, 2003

GOOD MORNING
I too want to chime in and say that I've found this thread incredibly informative and thanks OP for all of the info. I have had Jasmine as my standard rice for a while, with Basmati for Indian adjacent dishes.

Bought a bag of Nishiki medium grain the other day and will probably restock some of the Calrose.

Talked to the lady in the (southeast asian) international market about her technique for sticky rice, as I have a bag of 3 rings thats just been sitting there for a while.

I did take a cupful of dry sticky rice and toast it until quite brown, then pulverized it in a cuisinart to make a crunchy toasty dust sprinkling for salads, as I read about in a Thai cookbook.

mystes
May 31, 2006

I don't think I've ever actually liked rice pilaf but it's possible I've just never had a really good one so maybe I should look into that

dino.
Mar 28, 2010

Yip Yip, bitch.

Stoca Zola posted:

Thanks to this thread I remembered the sack of rice that my partner’s lovely Sikh coworker gave him when they were leaving town and didn’t want to have to lug with them. I think it’s in the top of my pantry still in the sack, I want to get it down and see what kind it is and if it is still ok. We are in a dry climate but I have no idea how old this rice is or the status of any possible pests. Is there a point where you should just give up on poorly cared for rice?

35 years if it's white rice. White rice has a freakishly long shelf life.


Hyperlynx posted:

edit edit: also, I'm in Australia, which I'm under the impression has pretty strict quarantine procedures for imports. (Well, or maybe that's just Western Australia). Has that been the case in your experience? (Well, assuming you send rice here).
So IMO the Thai rice you buy should have the "Hom Mali" sticker/seal on it. It's a premium product that's origin protected. Here's what it looks like:

http://www.sukhahousethailand.com/thai-hom-mali-rice-certificate/

Thai export standard is a minimum of 95% purity, but the vast majority of the stuff exported as Thai Hom Mali is like 97% or above. Here's the full list of Thai export standards for Hom Mali:

https://www.acfs.go.th/standard/download/eng/Thai_Hom_Mali.pdf

We only import rice to the USA, so I'm not familiar with import standards for Aus. I believe y'all have insane import rules, because of the masses of invasive species that can wiggle their way through your borders and wreak havoc on your local flora/fauna. However, check and see if there's a website where you can find a government agency that names and shames fuckups. In the USA, it's the FDA realist.

Here's one such example, talking about how tamarind imports are automatically detained without physical exam (i.e., the FDA demands to examine every single import of tamarind, and take samples, send to lab, and then and only then release it for selling) due to rodent, insect, or OTHER ANIMAL poops.

https://www.accessdata.fda.gov/CMS_IA/importalert_1175.html

Casually searching the FDA Red List for imports that you consume will be a very important learning experience.

Discendo Vox posted:

I appreciate your well-informed posts on FDA and NOP regulatory; as you indicate, rice has fewer issues than a lot of other commodities, and yeah, organic's an incredible shitpile of bad underlying science.

Organic and non-GMO is a butt-ton of bad science, and fearmongering, to be honest. I don't care for either.

PurpleXVI posted:

I consider the health reasons to wash rice somewhat eye-rolly, worries about heavy metals and such, at least in a place where food safety is as strictly regulated as in the EU in general(and Denmark in particular), but I do find that a quick wash(literally just put it in sieve and give it a quick splash under the faucet for ten seconds) tends to give the rice a nicer texture. Looks like what we get at our local store is a mixture of Indian and Pakistani imports repackaged(cleaned?) in Poland.

Also, genuinely, very interesting posts. I love to learn more about all these processes and the thought that goes into them, and logistics is just a fascinating topic by itself.

No matter how strict you think the regulations are in your country, wash your goddamned rice anyways. I can't speak for Pakistan's export standards, but I know that Indian export standards for Basmati are fairy strict, because Basmati is a protected term, and the Indian government takes that particular export very seriously. Export standard is 92% or higher purity, but most Basmati is like 97% or higher when exported to the USA.

PokeJoe posted:

I always wash my rice. Why? Because I'm on a strictly clean diet

Why are you like this. :|


Coasterphreak posted:

Uncle Roger say you need better rice joke

(good thread, dino)
Thanks. So I know a few Chinese folk who find Uncle Roger cringe at best, and outright harmful at worst. It made his stuff unwatchable for me.

pyknosis posted:

do you still need to wash your rice if you're gonna eat it raw

DO NOT EAT THE RICE WITHOUT COKING IT FOR gently caress'S SAKE.

Squashy Nipples posted:

I'm an rear end in a top hat, and I lost the magic measuring cup for my 2 quart Aroma rice cooker.

What are the actual measurements?
I know. I was there when I had to measure the rice. You can buy rice cooker cups on the Amazon. Here's a multipack for less than a tenner:

https://www.amazon.com/Plastic-Transparent-Measuring-Cooker-Tools/dp/B09ZBCXM5B

But also, it's 3/4 of a cup.

bloody ghost titty posted:

I went and got five# calrose for my daily and sone sooni for my south Asian dishes, thanks Dino for sharing a bunch of stuff I couldn’t parse out from various blogs!
Honestly, all this rice knowledge comes from using so much of it in my home cooking. The rest of the stuff about logistics and how rice gets manufactured and imported came from working in this job.

mobby_6kl posted:

That's an awesome thread and I'm sad I only noticed it it today for the first time. I usually use jasmine rice for everyday cooking as there's a big market nearby and I can get huge sacks at good prices directly from the Vietnamese sellers which is pretty nice.

What kind of rice would be best for Central-Asian type of pilaf though? I think I tried making this Uzbek plov with Basmati rice as that's what the limited specific information I could find seems to recommend. But I wonder if there are some pro-tips for this type of dishes (not my photo)

Central Asian will do well with either steam or parboiled basmati. You can use "white sella" or "golden sella", and get excellent results.

VictualSquid posted:

Parboiled rice works very well for pilavs it is what I use most of the time. Or Turkish rice, if I get some on sale. Also if you feel fancy do that trick where you replace around 1/10th of the rice with orzo pasta for contrast.

Yup! Due to the amount of stirring and such needed for rice, definitely use parboiled.

Also, Orzo is a hate crime. gently caress that garbage pasta.

Planet X posted:

I too want to chime in and say that I've found this thread incredibly informative and thanks OP for all of the info. I have had Jasmine as my standard rice for a while, with Basmati for Indian adjacent dishes.

Bought a bag of Nishiki medium grain the other day and will probably restock some of the Calrose.

Talked to the lady in the (southeast asian) international market about her technique for sticky rice, as I have a bag of 3 rings thats just been sitting there for a while.

I did take a cupful of dry sticky rice and toast it until quite brown, then pulverized it in a cuisinart to make a crunchy toasty dust sprinkling for salads, as I read about in a Thai cookbook.

If you have sticky rice, soak it overnight, and then cook it like normal white rice in the rice cooker. It will come out lovely.

uninterrupted
Jun 20, 2011

mystes posted:

I don't think I've ever actually liked rice pilaf but it's possible I've just never had a really good one so maybe I should look into that

Tablespoon of butter
1/2 cup broken up angel hair pasta (or I like to use orzo sometime)
1 cup rice (rice varietal suggestions for pilaf to be found above, I'm a schlub who uses the cheapest bag of uncle bens-ish generic)
3-3.5 cups water
1 tablespoon bullion powder (or sub stock for the water, just don't go to rich with the stock. This pilaf is a side dish)

Melt the butter on medium, toss in the pasta, sauté till light brown
Add rice, sauté till the grains look kinda translucent
Add water and a tablespoon of bullion powder (or just some chicken broth)
Bring to a boil
Lid on, heat down to low, simmer for 22 minutes

Serve with some plain yogurt on top, a sprinkle of sumac if you have it, alongside meat and veg

Main takeaways:
- use decent to good butter
- don't burn the butter

You can get more complicated with this, I sometimes toss in some mince garlic along with the rice into the butter, i would add some pine nuts too before a bag of them went up to like 60 bucks.

david_a
Apr 24, 2010




Megamarm
So how does this “always wash the rice” advice go together with recipes like the above where you fry/toast the raw rice before boiling it? Just throw in wet rice?

uninterrupted
Jun 20, 2011

david_a posted:

So how does this “always wash the rice” advice go together with recipes like the above where you fry/toast the raw rice before boiling it? Just throw in wet rice?

I've tried washing rice in a strainer that's in a big bowl, so I could easily change out the water, then spreading out the rice a bit on the strainer and letting it sit over the empty bowl for a bit to dry before using it.

It works, but I don't notice a difference between that and rawdogging rice straight out of the bag. You're already boiling pasta along with the rice so no matter what there's gonna be extra starch in the boiling liquid.

I've heard my family, and random people on the internet, say frying the rice "seals" it and keeps more starch in the rice grains. This is supposed to keep the pilaf from getting goopy. That said, I doubt a ton of science involves the word "goopy".

e:

It's not foolproof, but when you sautee the pasta/rice you typically have a range light on since the shade of brown of the pasta and translucence of the rice are really important things to note. If there's a rock/bug/whatever you'd probably see that during.

uninterrupted fucked around with this message at 19:36 on Jan 21, 2024

mawarannahr
May 21, 2019

mobby_6kl posted:

That's an awesome thread and I'm sad I only noticed it it today for the first time. I usually use jasmine rice for everyday cooking as there's a big market nearby and I can get huge sacks at good prices directly from the Vietnamese sellers which is pretty nice.

What kind of rice would be best for Central-Asian type of pilaf though? I think I tried making this Uzbek plov with Basmati rice as that's what the limited specific information I could find seems to recommend. But I wonder if there are some pro-tips for this type of dishes (not my photo)


VictualSquid posted:

Parboiled rice works very well for pilavs it is what I use most of the time. Or Turkish rice, if I get some on sale. Also if you feel fancy do that trick where you replace around 1/10th of the rice with orzo pasta for contrast.

You are going to want laser rice. I'm not kidding: https://barlos.shop/products/barlos-laser-rice

I have read basmati may be acceptable, and I have also read that Turkish rice (baldo), while common for making Özbek pilavı in Turkey, is completely inauthentic.

VictualSquid
Feb 29, 2012

Gently enveloping the target with indiscriminate love.

mawarannahr posted:

I have read basmati may be acceptable, and I have also read that Turkish rice (baldo), while common for making Özbek pilavı in Turkey, is completely inauthentic.

The thing to understand about pilavs is that it is impossible to make it inauthentic. You can walk from Spain to Japan and have a different locally authentic pilav-style dish every day. Each is also inauthentic to the village you were in yesterday. And then do the same again including Africa or the Americas.

Thirteen Orphans
Dec 2, 2012

I am a writer, a doctor, a nuclear physicist and a theoretical philosopher. But above all, I am a man, a hopelessly inquisitive man, just like you.
I use a rice cooker and do the “first joint first finger” method of making sure I put the right amount of water in (I usually eat sushi rice). I have to switch to brown rice; is there a different technique for how much water I’ll need?

therattle
Jul 24, 2007
Soiled Meat

Thirteen Orphans posted:

I use a rice cooker and do the “first joint first finger” method of making sure I put the right amount of water in (I usually eat sushi rice). I have to switch to brown rice; is there a different technique for how much water I’ll need?

I can’t give an exact amount but it needs more. Maybe 20%? I usually just eyeball it and it’s ok. Brown rice, to me at least, can take a lot of cooking and water, and I think is often served undercooked in a lot of places, which is, I think, why a lot of people don’t like it. It’s not cooked with enough water and it’s too tough. It can bear being cooked with too much water more than too little.

I’d be very curious to see if others agree.

Stoca Zola
Jun 28, 2008

Rice update: the rice was open but a clip was sealing the bag. It’s Daawat Biryani basmati rice, looks yellow and smells nutty. Very long grains, couldn’t see any pests or broken grains. Lots of opaque white grains though, maybe 20%?

The vital statistics though, this is 2017s crop and was packed in 2020. The bag says it expired in October 2022 - two years after packing seems to be a pessimistic opinion of the longevity of this rice!

Planet X
Dec 10, 2003

GOOD MORNING

therattle posted:

I can’t give an exact amount but it needs more. Maybe 20%? I usually just eyeball it and it’s ok. Brown rice, to me at least, can take a lot of cooking and water, and I think is often served undercooked in a lot of places, which is, I think, why a lot of people don’t like it. It’s not cooked with enough water and it’s too tough. It can bear being cooked with too much water more than too little.

I’d be very curious to see if others agree.

I agree. I'm not an expert, but I agree.

mobby_6kl
Aug 9, 2009

by Fluffdaddy

VictualSquid posted:

Parboiled rice works very well for pilavs it is what I use most of the time. Or Turkish rice, if I get some on sale. Also if you feel fancy do that trick where you replace around 1/10th of the rice with orzo pasta for contrast.
Huh interesting about the parboiled, I never thought of it as an option but reading the OP, it does make sense if it better deals with the mixing you're supposed to do once the rice is cooked.

mystes posted:

I don't think I've ever actually liked rice pilaf but it's possible I've just never had a really good one so maybe I should look into that
I think it really depends a lot on how it's made. I've had Afghan pilaf just a few weeks ago at a in Frankfurt eatery of all places:


It was fine but pretty unremarkable I thought, the better Uzbek pilafs I've tried just felt much richer and flavorful. Although the one local restaurant I tried wasn't that great, so YMMV. I'd try DIY and a few restaurants if you have any for reference.

As someone else mentioned, what's "authentic" is all questionable and will vary region to region but you can find some typical ways of making it on youtube.

dino. posted:

...
Central Asian will do well with either steam or parboiled basmati. You can use "white sella" or "golden sella", and get excellent results.

Yup! Due to the amount of stirring and such needed for rice, definitely use parboiled.

Also, Orzo is a hate crime. gently caress that garbage pasta.
Thanks! I'll have to see what exactly "white sella" is and how it maps to what's being sold here (not the US) but seems like parboiled basmati would be better than regular one I've used, at least.

What's your opinion on the vermicelli that the Egyptians like to put in the rice? :thunk:

VictualSquid posted:

The thing to understand about pilavs is that it is impossible to make it inauthentic. You can walk from Spain to Japan and have a different locally authentic pilav-style dish every day. Each is also inauthentic to the village you were in yesterday. And then do the same again including Africa or the Americas.
That's absolutely true of course, but I think if you like a particular type of pilaf, you have to try to replicate it as much as possible otherwise you'd end up with something else entirely :) Nothing wrong with that either of course, sometimes I just throw poo poo together so I have something to eat and it's fine too.

for fucks sake
Jan 23, 2016

therattle posted:

I can’t give an exact amount but it needs more. Maybe 20%? I usually just eyeball it and it’s ok. Brown rice, to me at least, can take a lot of cooking and water, and I think is often served undercooked in a lot of places, which is, I think, why a lot of people don’t like it. It’s not cooked with enough water and it’s too tough. It can bear being cooked with too much water more than too little.

I’d be very curious to see if others agree.

Yeah I think it needs more water due to longer cooking time meaning more evaporation. I do most of my rice cooking in a pressure cooker these days, and because there's no evaporation the ratio of rice to water is pretty much always 1:1 regardless of the type of rice.

E-flat
Jun 22, 2007

3-flat
Reading the stuff about pests and pest control was really eye opening. I used to work for a food pantry as a warehouse manager, and more than once (though very rarely!) we’d find bugs in our bags of rice. I can’t recall the brand(s) other than we usually got our rice in one pound bags that had a red label, but mahatma and goya are familiar names.

We got most of our food from a local food bank. They gave our other warehouse pantry moths, and frequently would give us stuff past the best-by date. (Granted, those dates aren’t federally regulated or even required, but we still couldn’t give outdated food out.)

As a total rice novice who has been frustrated by gummy fried rice, the other parts of this thread have also been helpful. :chef:

TheParadigm
Dec 10, 2009

Earwicker posted:

i dont remember white rice ever being "demonized" nor have i ever met anyone who was afraid of it or thought that it was actively bad for you or anything, but there's a general perception that brown rice is healthier for some reason. i have no idea why. maybe because it doesn't taste as good?

I wanted to ask about this because i saw that it didn't get much attention and was just reading the thread


White rice wasn't demonized but msg was in the 90s and 80s. Do you think that had anything to do related food not entering the american staple/ culinary vernacular as hard as it otherwise would have?

PokeJoe
Aug 24, 2004

hail cgatan


I remember white rice being seen as bad and brown rice being pushed for a few years but everyone immediately realized brown rice tastes like cardboard and takes too long to cook

therattle
Jul 24, 2007
Soiled Meat

PokeJoe posted:

I remember white rice being seen as bad and brown rice being pushed for a few years but everyone immediately realized brown rice tastes like cardboard and takes too long to cook

Properly cooked brown rice is actually pretty good in certain uses. Short grain brown is quite delicious; it’s a good GF sub for barley. I use it with Japanese soups, for example, where it works really well.

Switchback
Jul 23, 2001

dino. posted:


Thanks. So I know a few Chinese folk who find Uncle Roger cringe at best, and outright harmful at worst. It made his stuff unwatchable for me.

Unless those friends are Malaysian (or Singaporean) Chinese, they can shove it. Uncle Roger is a national hero :colbert:

Seriously though this is a great thread. Thank you for making it. After many years of loving up rice, I finally figured out how to make jasmine rice and it comes out perfect every time. Maybe I can branch out now that I’ve read this thread (no I will not.)



How bad is this rice? It looks like every grain is broken and 30% are chalky. This is jasmine rice purchased in Australia, so we ain’t getting any higher quality product down here even if maybe it doesn’t have bugs..

PokeJoe
Aug 24, 2004

hail cgatan


therattle posted:

Properly cooked brown rice is actually pretty good in certain uses. Short grain brown is quite delicious; it’s a good GF sub for barley. I use it with Japanese soups, for example, where it works really well.

it still takes too long :colbert:

therattle
Jul 24, 2007
Soiled Meat

PokeJoe posted:

it still takes too long :colbert:

Just change your timings! If I’m making brown rice it just becomes the first thing I do.

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VictualSquid
Feb 29, 2012

Gently enveloping the target with indiscriminate love.
I remember one of the GWS questions threads had someone who was afraid that white rice will kill him with diabetes if he ate it every day. He was asking for ideas because he moved to some pacific island where everybody eats white rice every day and other starches were comically expensive.
First and last time I had heard of the idea.

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