So you’ve experimented with numerous biryani recipes tried-and-tested by the best chefs, yet something is amiss. May be it’s the rice. Did you know that there are different variants of rice that you can choose from to cook an appropriate dish? Well if you’re amazed by this little piece of information, read on to find out more rice facts that celebrity chef, Sanjeev Kapoor shares with us.
Different varieties of rice
The different varieties of rice include long-grained like Basmati, short grained like surti kolam and brown rice.
Dishes like Biryani require superior quality rice. Everyone must try and use original Basmati rice and not just the simple long-grained rice especially for making dishes like Biryani. The reason being that biryani is known for its flavour and aroma and that can only be achieved with good quality Basmati rice.
Best Daily Rice
Health-wise, I suggest eating brown rice on a daily basis. I have been eating it since a decade now. Brown rice is extremely healthy because the bran and hull are still intact in it. It is rich in proteins, thiamine, calcium, magnesium, fiber and potassium. Also, for those looking to shed those extra kilos, brown rice is ideal as it has a low glycemic rating and consists of naturally occurring oils that help normalise cholesterol levels.
How to choose the best basmati?
There is a way to cook each rice dish differently. As each dish involves different ingredients, flavours and cooking time, hence the choice of rice should be apt. A very common problem with everyone is that it is very difficult to choose the perfect Basmati rice that would suit the dish. Daawat’s Basmati rice brings us the rice with all its health benefits intact as well as gives a wide variety to choose from, that would suit a particular preparation.
If you are serving dishes like kadhi, rajma, chole and the likes, I would say, try and keep the rice as plain as possible – like a simple steamed rice would just do as it will go well, balancing the flavours with the accompanying gravy/curry. But for dishes like biryanis and pulaos, where the rice preparation is itself full of ingredients that impart strong flavours and taste, all you would need is a plain raita or a simple salad to go with it.
Tips:
1. While cooking rice, soak it for a minimum of 20 minutes to get best results.
2. In case of cooking the rice with the drainage method, that is, discarding the water in which the rice is soaked, use 4-5 times the water while cooking the rice.
3. After the rice is cooked, in case you are serving it later and not immediately, ensure to spread the cooked rice on a plate to stop the carry-on cooking.
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