Do you rinse your rice before cooking it?

Shermie said:
And we thought that brown rice was supposed to be healthier for us than white rice!! What do they know?!! :mad:
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Well everything is poisonous to some extent so I wouldn't worry about it too much. If we listened to every health scare we wouldn't eat anything which whilst cures most things would probably become another health scare in itself :meh:
 
Shermie said:
I bought a 25-lb bag of white rice that lasted for almost a year. Nothing went wrong with it! It was just as fresh as the day that it was bought. Bought another one, this one weighing 20lbs, before Christmas.

Brown rice, on the other hand, does not last as long. It tends to start spoiling in probably about 4 or 5 months.
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Well I have never really kept rice long enough to know whether it would go bad or not. Since I do not usually buy rice in bulk (in fact I buy small bags at a time), it is usually used up in about just over a week. However, taking into account all the posts that I have read here, it seems like it is a good idea to wash rice before cooking it, so I will continue to do so. I never knew why I did it, it is just that I have seen it done by my mother over the years, and it just seems to me like the natural thing to do.
 
Caribbean girl said:
Well I have never really kept rice long enough to know whether it would go bad or not. Since I do not usually buy rice in bulk (in fact I buy small bags at a time), it is usually used up in about just over a week. However, taking into account all the posts that I have read here, it seems like it is a good idea to wash rice before cooking it, so I will continue to do so. I never knew why I did it, it is just that I have seen it done by my mother over the years, and it just seems to me like the natural thing to do.
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Our mom ALWAYS did it as well. Religiously!!!

She never would put a pot of rice on the store before washing it first! Even parboiled rice! I used to do it as well, but stopped. When I was doing it, it just seemed like something was missing.
Like the flavor, taste & texture of the rice somehow changed. So now, I just measure 2 cups of it, put it in the rice cooker's bowl, add the measured water, salt & butter, plug in & turn on the cooker and let it do its thing. :wink:
 
I inherited from my grandmother and mother that we should wash two times the rice before cooking it. And up to now that I had a family of my own I do the same way of cooking our rice. And the water after washing the rice we used it to water our flowering plants in our garden especially our orchids because it always blooms flowers because of the rice water.
 
I am not a good rice maker, I have found that when I rinse the rice it is not a sticky so I rinse the rice to avoid throwing it out after I cook it.
 
I like the stickiness, full aroma & taste of the rice, which is why I don't rinse it before cooking it.

It's not gummy or too soft at all, just the normal way that it comes out after cooking it. :wink:
 
I guess I've always cleaned my rice because it gets a tad more fluffy than if you ignore that part of the process. Now, that is, I'm only referring to white rice. I've not rinsed brown or any other style but I can see why you would.
 
i never rinse rice before cooking it,lets face it if the rice was contaminated with any thing, rinsing it under water would not do a lot..I remember a case of lettuce growing in raw sewage ,imported from Spain,gave loads of people food poisoning ,first reaction it was not washed correctly,fact is that washing never made any difference,it was contaminated ,even a pre wash tablet would not make any difference ,you are in the hands of the food producers and manufactures
 
I understood that washing was just to remove the starch dust from surface of the grains, caused by them rubbing together in transit. That and the odd bit of grit. I wouldn't think washing would do anything about things like arsenic, which would be within the grain itself. So if I rinse rice, I do it to get the dust off, and make it less starchy when cooking.
 
I have to admit this is a step I'm guilty of skipping. But when I add water to the rice, the water stays relatively clean looking, so I think there is no need. I do remember years ago, there was a rice I bought that when I added water, the water turned all dirty and scummy. So of course that I rinsed. But if I add water to any dried foods that call for rinsing, I don't end of doing it if the water stays clean looking.
 
Always. 2 or 3 times in fresh water. Rice tends to be preserved in tumeric, so if you don't rinse it you'll get off white looking rice when there cooked. Its good to soak them for 30 mins beforehand also. Softens them up and makes them easier to cook.
 
My family always rinses the rice before cooking it. Now, it may be a little different here, because rice is sold from street vendors most of the time, so it wouldn't be as hygienic as something from a packet in the supermarket. The only time I don't rinse my rice is when I make risotto. I heard that it's the starch that makes it creamy. No idea if it's true though
 
As I understand, the rice that has arsenic is coming primarily from China where they use arsenic to poison the rats that would otherwise run rampant in the fields. I do not think they are doing this in US organic rice production. I eat a lot of rice, but all the rice I have been getting is organic, GMO free and grown in the US. I think as far as the arsenic goes, you are just going to have to pay more and get the organic rice to avoid it. It probably isn't going to hurt you that much if you don't eat a lot of it.
 
DancingLady said:
As I understand, the rice that has arsenic is coming primarily from China where they use arsenic to poison the rats that would otherwise run rampant in the fields. I do not think they are doing this in US organic rice production. I eat a lot of rice, but all the rice I have been getting is organic, GMO free and grown in the US. I think as far as the arsenic goes, you are just going to have to pay more and get the organic rice to avoid it. It probably isn't going to hurt you that much if you don't eat a lot of it.
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Rice that has arsenic in it?? In the US?? You guys do realize that the US has mega strict rules for imports, right? I think maybe the news headlines just made that up. My country is right next to China, has super lax import rules, and there's never been a problem with the rice. With a lot of other stuff from China, but never rice
 
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