kokonamu

Japanese Basics: How to make Japanese-style plain rice and sushi rice

by justhungry

Rice is the staple of Japanese food, and making it just right can be rather difficult if you don't know how. If you think you will be preparing rice regularly, an electric rice cooker will make your life so much easier. (See About rice cookers.) You can cook non-Japanese style rice and other grains in a rice cooker too.

Japanese rice, or japonica rice, is a very particular variety. For traditional Japanese dishes you simply cannot substitute long-grain rice, jasmine rice, basmati rice, Carolina type rice, and so on. I sometimes hear people saying things like "But I can make onigiri with jasmine rice just fine, as long as I cook it so it's mushy and the grains stick together". No no no no no. A good onigiri, a good sushi roll, a good nigiri-zushi, and most of all a good bowl of rice does not have mushy rice.

Wonder Boner

How Much Water Does Pasta Really Need?

By The Curious Cook HAROLD McGEE

Published at NYT: February 24, 2009

 

photo: justbento

 

SOME time ago, as I emptied a big pot of pasta water into the sink and waited for the fog to lift from my glasses, a simple question occurred to me. Why boil so much more water than pasta actually absorbs, only to pour it down the drain? Couldn’t we cook pasta just as well with much less water and energy? Another question quickly followed: if we could, what would the defenders of Italian tradition say?

 

After some experiments, I’ve found that we can indeed make pasta in just a few cups of water and save a good deal of energy. Not that much in your kitchen or mine — just the amount needed to keep a burner on high for a few more minutes. But Americans cook something like a billion pounds of pasta a year, so those minutes could add up.