That’s a lot of rice!
On a Tuesday’s post in Chow Times, Ben wrote: “Suanne and I simply need rice. If we go a few days without rice, we felt like we had not eaten at all“. Being Chinese, I think I understand that very, very well. Panamanians had a similar issue, where the staple day-to-day dish is rice, beans and beef, if they did not have rice, they felt they didn’t eat at all. (Consumption of rice in Panama is around 72Kg per person per year!).
For me, from a cooking perspective, rice is one of those ingredients that is not worth preparing small amounts, even with a rice cooker (even using a supposedly no-stick one, I still had some sticking to the “bowl”). As a result, ever since I moved to live on my own, I seldom cooked rice. During the first couple of weeks, I struggled and I overate to satiate that “void” created by not eating rice. But after a couple of months, I started to get used to other forms of carbs, mainly noodles and bread.
When I visited my parents in Panama last year and told them about my change of diet, they were, to say the least, perplexed. How could I not eat THE staple of both Chinese and Panamanian diet? That’s when I started to compare it to other cultures. In the case of other Latin country, the staple would be either maize/corn or potatoes. In the case of European cultures, we have bread, pasta (including couscous) and potatoes. So, there are other staples out there yet, what makes rice different compared to, say, pasta?
After checking these pages on nutrition of rice and pasta, I think I finally found out why: A mass of cup of pasta is less than that of a cup of rice! Since we often gauge the amount of food we eat based on the volume rather than mass or weight, of course eating a bowl of rice would make you fuller than a bowl of pasta.
Of course, I already overcame that psychological issue and nowadays will eat what I consider to be moderate and enough for me. But, whenever I cook rice, I use this recipe:
1 cup of basmati brown rice (do not soak!)
2 cup of hot water (broth will do better)
1 small onion
1 small can of tomato paste (optional)
1 tablespoon of oil
Salt, pepper and bayleaf
Preheat an oven at 375C. Dice the onion. On a stove at low heat, heat the saucepan and add a bit of the oil. Add the diced onion with a bit of salt. Cook lightly until translucent. Add the rice and stir. Let the rice grains roast a little bit. If it burns slightly, that’s fine. Don’t let it burn completely, though, so stir often. If using the tomato paste, add about 2/3 of the can and stir. Add the water (or broth) and wait until it boil. In a small square baking dish, spray some cooking spray. Transfer the rice mix to the baking dish, add some pepper and the bayleaf. Stir so the rice is layered evenly in the baking dish. Cover with aluminum foil. Bake it for around 55 minutes. Remove the aluminum foil, remove the bayleaf and fluffle. Serve immediately.
Yup, that’s a brown rice recipe! Needless to say, whenever I prepare rice, I overindulge myself and eat almost as if there is no tomorrow!
So, do you feel you have to eat rice? What is your favourite rice dish?
