A new year's resolution was to try more new recipes. I was shooting for
one/week, but I'm already behind. I'm a good cook, but I tend to get
into ruts. I get to the grocery store, look around, and end up making
something that's good and that I already know how to do. (I also
resolved to spend less time on usenet and therefore quit my other 2
groups, then realized that resolution #1 was interfering with resolution
#2 and decided to subscribe here to get that kick I need to expand my
cooking horizons. Besides, there's a viciousness on rfc that I've
missed though I haven't missed all the bottom-posting with the untrimmed
previous messages.)


The question is about the cooking time for brown rice. I've made it
hundreds of times before. To cook it plain, I measure and boil water
and salt, add rice, reboil, cover, reduce heat, time 40 minutes, and it
is ready. If I don't measure exactly, don't time exactly or let the
simmer too hard or too softly, it still comes out fine. The recipe I
tried the other night called for browning chicken and onions in a dutch
oven, adding white wine, canned crushed tomatoes, a green pepper, water,
spices, salt, bringing all to a boil, then adding brown rice, reboil,
lower to a simmer, etc. It was supposed to take 40 minutes. It took at
least double that time.


In fact, every time I try to cook rice with vegetables or cook it in
stock instead of water, the cooking time is greatly increased. I've
read all about how beans don't take longer to cook when flavor is added
to the cooking water, but what about rice? It sure SEEMS to take
longer. I would have assumed that this dish would take forever, but I
was so determined to follow the recipe exactly as per my resolution that
I let my guard down. When it took almost 2 hours to cook as I should
have known it would, I wondered if anyone had tested the recipe before
publishing it in the local newspaper. Any ideas?


--Lia

One time on Usenet, Julia Altshuler > said:

> The question is about the cooking time for brown rice. I've made it
> hundreds of times before. To cook it plain, I measure and boil water
> and salt, add rice, reboil, cover, reduce heat, time 40 minutes, and it
> is ready. If I don't measure exactly, don't time exactly or let the
> simmer too hard or too softly, it still comes out fine. The recipe I
> tried the other night called for browning chicken and onions in a dutch
> oven, adding white wine, canned crushed tomatoes, a green pepper, water,
> spices, salt, bringing all to a boil, then adding brown rice, reboil,
> lower to a simmer, etc. It was supposed to take 40 minutes. It took at
> least double that time.

<snip>

We cook brown rice for 55-60 minutes, as per bag instructions.
Fourty minutes doesn't seem like enough time. What brand of rice
are you using?

--
J.J. in WA ~ mom, vid gamer, novice cook ~
"You still haven't explained why the pool is
filled with elf blood." - Frylock, ATHF