Brown Rice

Directions

1 cup uncooked short- or medium-grain weighs 7 ounces (200 g).

1 cup uncooked long-grain weighs 6½ ounces (180 g).

As a rule of thumb for the absorption method, use 2 parts liquid to 1 part rice.

Cook most brown rice for 40 to 50 minutes, but different varieties cook at slightly different rates, so always check the package instructions.

1 cup uncooked rice yields 3 cups (525 g) cooked.

1 cup uncooked short-or medium-grain rice yields 3 cups (525 g) cooked.

Notes

• Why I love it: As an early 1970s hippie health food, brown rice became shorthand for a lifestyle that likely included Grateful Dead LPs, Dr. Bronner's soap, ample cannabis, and the whiff of patchouli. That's me today-minus the, ahem, patchouli, of course. Brown rice may not be as fluffy as white rice can be, but I'm a fan of its nutritional content and its mellow flavor.

• What it tastes like: Given all its varieties (see Common Forms, below), brown rice ranges in fla- vor, too. All brown rices are chewier than their white, more refined forms, and the flavors are generally nutty and sweet; jasmine and basmati are quite fra- grant. Short-grain will be a little stickier and clump- ier, while long-grain rices will retain separate grains.

• Common forms: There are many: short-, medium-, and long-grain (including basmati and jasmine) varieties; there is even sweet brown rice, which becomes very sticky when cooked and can be used for dishes such as Thai rice balls. There are proprietary types of whole-grain rice as well, grown by producers who breed them for special

characteristics and give them brand names, an indicator of the growing popularity of whole-grain rice. And brown isn't the only "color"-rices such as Chinese black rice and purple Thai rice are also whole-grain with the color coming from their bran layer.

•> Favorite ways to prepare it: Any way you like white rice. For this book, I'm sticking to just short- and long-grain brown rices (with one exception- the sweet brown rice in Super Grain Mix, page 65). Rices do well with any cooking method- absorption, boil-like-pasta, or pilaf-and they cook well in soups and stews. Just remember brown rice takes quite a while to cook, so you need to coordinate with the cooking times of your other ingredients.

•> How it's good for you: Brown rice has more than twice as much of just about every nutrient as white rice. The exception is protein, but that's only because much of the brown rice kernel is fiber and not just protein and starch, as with white rice, so it's not a fair fight.