Light & fluffy rice recipe (How to cook perfect rice) | Rice recipes & snacks and side dishes

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"Great kit makes cooking a pleasure."
Jamie Oliver

Kids crackers, set of 6
£12.00

light and fluffy rice

snacks and sides | serves 4 - 6
This is my basic recipe for getting perfect rice every time. Have a go at mastering it – you’ll be amazed at the light and fluffy results.

Once you’ve got the hang of that, you can have a go at flavouring it - any flavouring you boil with the rice will infuse it with wonderful fragrances and flavours. So try boiling things like fresh herbs, a cinnamon stick, a few cardamom pods, a strip of lemon zest or even a green tea bag in the water with the rice.

Doubling the amounts in the recipe will give you enough rice to serve 8-12 people.

• Put a large pan of salted water on a high heat and bring to the boil
• Rinse the rice in a colander under running water for about 1 minute, or until the water runs clear (this will stop the grains sticking together later)
• Add your rice to the boiling water and wait for the grains to start dancing around
• From that point, boil for 5 minutes
• Drain the rice in a colander
• Pour 2.5cm of water into the pan, put it back on the heat and bring it to the boil again, then turn down to a simmer
• Cover the rice in the colander with foil or a lid
• Place the colander on top of the pan of simmering water and let the rice steam over it for 8 to 10 minutes
• Remove from the heat and if you’re ready, serve immediately
• If not, leave the foil or lid on and put aside until ready to serve – it should stay warm for about 20 minutes

• from Jamie's Ministry of Food

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ingredients

• sea salt
• 350g basmati rice

user comments

11 comments

1. sabrina Wed 07 Oct 2009 @ 23:52 if using basmati rice soak for half hour then rinse.
Place however much rice you're going to use in a saucepan with lots of water, add in a stck of cinnamon and 2-3 cardommon pods and let it come to full boil.
Once it reaches full boiling point let it simmer on low flame and time for 2mins, after 2 mins drain rice in kolander (excuse my spelling mistake!) dont let the rice stand for long, place rice back into saucepan and let it sit for 5 mins on no heat.

A friend told me to try it like this and it worked for me!

2. Ryan Wed 22 Apr 2009 @ 18:38 There is a much simpler method: Twice as much water than rice; put both in pot and bring to boil, then cover with tight fitting lit and place on low heat. Since the seal is tight the steam dowes not escape so your rice steams rather than boils and you don't even need to time it. You can leave it on the stove until you are ready and it is always perfect. Try it and tell me if it is never perfect :)

3. dreams Fri 27 Feb 2009 @ 03:10 hi jamie....ur a gr8 chefs..i love thing u cook
and :

i got a very good recipe for rice.. :))

1-rinse 2 cups rice with a runny water. after that drain it.
2- put a little bit oil in the pan with 2 pices cardomum
3-heat the pan..and then put the rice and stir a little
4- add 2 cups of water .+ salt ....then let them boil.
5-low the heat and leave it 20 min

and enjooooy the lovely rice ...and u jamie try it... :))) u will love it

4. misty Tue 17 Feb 2009 @ 14:21 my ever-succesful rice :
fry chopped onion
rinse your rice in water till it is clear
add 1 cup of rice to onion , fry for a moment
add 1.5 cups of water
boil
add salt
put lid , on the smallest fire
when water is out - your rice is perfect

for brown rice -use 2 cups of water instead of 1.5
try it !! :-)

5. Iris (Montreal) Mon 16 Feb 2009 @ 02:07 Thank you Jamie - this works so well.... it is really light and fluffy. I stir in a little butter at the end, and it's heaven!! :-) Great with a broken up citronella stick in the water too, so fragrant.
I used to do basmati rice in the microwave - it yielded great results until I got a more powerful one; I ended up with sticky, mushy rice, and could not correct this. I also ended up with rice sticking in the pan on the stove, so this new steaming method is great for me. I'll have to give it a try with brown rice, which I usually mess up...

6. renee Sun 25 Jan 2009 @ 00:06 ive never ever been able to make rice, even following methods, this one i will try, i love cooking and i wont give up till ive got cooked rice sussed! haha

7. clare Sat 17 Jan 2009 @ 17:44 i tried this not expecting it to turn out and it was great. i made it into egg fried rice

thanks Jamie you made my dinner x

8. Rui Wed 17 Dec 2008 @ 19:11 I'll be trying it. I eat at the indian restaurant and I love it, I hope it works!!

9. Lynn Wed 03 Dec 2008 @ 23:28 Will this method work for brown rice as well?

10. sweetgal Sat 18 Oct 2008 @ 21:14 hey Jaime... i was just going through your vegetable jalfrezi... etc n now rice... its funny in a way.... i am from India and thats exactly how we do it but it still looks different in a way... u get what i am saying...lol...

keep it up...
cheers..!!!!

11. Craig Mon 13 Oct 2008 @ 04:09 I've never understood why there are so many "involved" recipes for cooking rice, or much worse in my opinion "rice cookers". I've always used what I learned as the "20 minute method":
Twice as much water as rice
bring water to a boil.
add in rice.
bring back to a boil.
stir once, put the lid on, turn the heat down as low as you can get it.
time 20 minutes do NOT open the lid during that time... perfect rice every time.
(brown rice? use 45 minutes instead of 20)
-craig