Wet rice can ruin a whole meal. With rice cookers taking a little some, often, by the time your rice cooker is finished and your meal is ready, there isn’t enough time to cook a fresh batch. However, lucky for you! There are a few secret tips to save a disastrous batch of rice.
When rice comes out of a rice cooker wet, immediately turn it onto a baking tray – spreading it into a thin layer, trying to cover as much surface area as possible. Put into the oven at 400°F for 10 minutes or when dried, repeatedly turning while cooking.
This is my go-to method. However, I have a great hit rate with rice (now). There are times when it mysteriously just goes wrong. If you don’t have an oven (or your range is full), several alternatives and practical methods will help save your dinner!
You can fix up the rice in the actual rice cooker. This method is ideal if you aren’t under time pressure or have a kitchen FULL of food cooking. It takes a little more time than my favourite oven method, but the outcome should be the same.
Drain any liquid from the rice cooker bowl. Dump the wet rice through a colander to push through any excess water, and put the rice back in the bowl.
Set the rice cooker on to cook WITH THE LID OPEN and continuously stir the rice,
The bowl’s heat will naturally start dehydrating the rice and cooking off the excess. Now I have to be honest. Your rice will never return to its former glory. However, this technique will serve you far nicer and almost perfect rice!
This one is great if your rice is starting to turn and you caught it just in time. Food continues cooking even after you remove it from heat. If your rice is about to be overdone, quickly pour it into a colander and douse it with cold water. This should stop any further damage to your beautiful brown rice.
But you’re now stuck with slightly soggy cold-wet rice… Pour it back into the rice cooker (as per above), ensuring as little water is in the mix as possible. Turn the rice cooker on. Leaving the lid open (this is to ensure any extra moisture doesn’t get trapped inside, and rehydrate the rice.
This should heat the rice and cook off any remaining starchy residue, unlike the method above, which is for nearly ruined rice. This method should only take a couple of minutes to finish the rice.
When life gives you wet rice, make rice pudding!
Sometimes your rice is just ruined – and that’s okay. Part of cooking is making mistakes *or having mistakes happen to you!
I am forever looking for ways to minimise food waste, be it being a little more mindful about portions or purposefully making too much for dinner – so I have enough food for a meal tomorrow (and save prep time). However, being less wasteful with seemingly burnt or spoiled food can be tricky and require a little thinking outside the box (or the rice cooker).
Thankfully spoiled rice is fantastic for one thing. RICE PUDDING!
Now I famously don’t give recipes on this site. However, I will make an exception to help save all the ruined rice. These quantities have been adjusted to consider the starch and rice already.
For every cup of rice you have. Add the following straight to the already cooked rice:
1.5 cup milk
1/2 cup sugar
A splash of vanilla (optional)
Stir everything in VERY well before running a rice cycle – You want to ensure nothing is stuck to the pan’s bottom. Once you have mixed everything, you’ll be left with what looks like a questionable mess – This is perfectly normal.
Run a cycle, stirring a few times to ensure nothing is catching on the pan still.
Once you have salvaged your rice, it’s worth taking a moment to work out – What went wrong? Sometimes it’s as simple as misjudging the amount of water you put in. As a rule of thumb, white rice should be 1:1 with water.
There are exceptions to this rule, some types of rice need a little more or a little less. It’s worth checking the rice packaging (or google) for your specific.
If you are using the same rice cooker with the same rice, and your rice cooker has randomly turned out a bad batch – it’s time to check it. Firstly run a test cycle of rice – (Don’t worry, you can store the rice in the refrigerator for use the next day). If your rice comes out fine, it may be “one of those things” Rice cookers can infrequently throw out a bad pot of rice. Sometimes it burns, and sometimes it doesn’t heat properly.
Suppose your rice cooker is pulling out the wrong batch time and time again. It may be worth considering a new rice cooker – Rice cookers do last years, although – like most electronics – things go wrong.
Having run high-volume restaurants for years, we always have industrial rice cookers on cook for at least 10 hours a day – and they break after a while.
Most of the time, the problems are due to the thermostats and timers rather than the heating elements, meaning the units are done. I had enquired a few times about repairing units rather than buying new ones, but most of the time, its simply not worth it. Even if the repairs cost a little less than a new unit, you are still left with an older unit with a couple of new parts. Meaning something else could blow in a month or two.
Rice cookers are pretty affordable. Treat yourself (when you can) to a brand new rice cooker!!
Rice cookers are spot on 99% of the time. Sadly there is the 1% of the time when things don’t go quite to plan. Depending on how wt your rice is, you will want to use different methods.
A little wet – Use cold water to douse the rice cold. Strain the water and return to the pan – Run a cycle, and stir continuously.
Very wet – Strain excess water, splay on a baking sheet and oven
Very Very Wet – Make Rice pudding!!!
