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My favorite kitchen tool for eating great and managing my weight is the slow cooker.
If I had to choose a first-runner up, it would be a rice cooker, so today I’m giving one away. You’ll find all the details at the end of the post.
As Nigella Lawson persuasively explains in her wonderful cookbook, Nigella Kitchen: Recipes from the Heart of the Home (affiliate link), “…It isn’t a coincidence that all rice-eating cultures have a version: these things, which range from basic to luxury, really do work. I cannot tell you now much easier it makes your life when you can come home, pour rice and water into the cooker, flick on a switch and just walk away without having to think about it again. And this makes a difference across the board: from feeding children to giving dinner parties…”
The Best Way to Cook Rice
Google, “The Best Way to Cook Rice” and be prepared to be overwhelmed by all the different theories and approaches, from simple to complex, on the best way to cook rice. Just reading some of these recipes made my head hurt. No wonder people get overwhelmed in the kitchen.
My approach to life and cooking is to keep things as simple as possible. Because if things are simple enough, we might actually do them!
The best way to cook rice is with a rice cooker (affiliate link).
Author of The Food Lab: Better Home Cooking Through Science, J. Kenji López-Alt agrees: “There’s no easier, more foolproof way to cook rice and other grains that in a rice cooker. Sure you can cook rice in a pot, carefully monitoring the flame, hoping that you’ve added just the right amount of water and that your rice isn’t burning on the bottom, and taking it off the heat at just the right moment, but if you’re anything like me, you’ve burned one too many batches to fuss with that method any more. With a rice cooker, you just add your rice and water, shut the lid, flip the switch, and go, with the added advantage that it’ll keep the cooked rice (or there grain) hot for hours.”
If you don’t have a rice cooker, two other easy options are to:
Some of my favorite easy healthy Weight Watchers friendly rice recipes include:
- Hot + Cold Chicken with Brown Rice Bowl
- Brown Rice Tomato Basil Salad
- Weight Watchers Easy Arroz Con Pollo (Chicken with Rice)
- Slow Cooker Cheesy Chicken & Rice Casserole
- Savory Slow Cooker Brown Rice + Lentils
- Slow Cooker Rice
- Slow Cooker Turkey and Wild Rice Casserole
- Crock Pot Wild Rice
- Fried Rice with Vegetables + Ham
- Creamy Slow Cooker Rice Pudding
The Best Way to Cook Rice Cooker Giveaway Details
TO ENTER
1. Leave a comment below answering the question, “What is your biggest kitchen/cooking challenge?”
A winner will be selected at random and announced next Sunday.
Good luck!
3/26/17: This giveaway is now over.
The winner is Carole Cushman who commented, “My biggest challenge is planning and then sticking to it!”
Congratulations Carole! Please contact us at support@simple-nourished-living.com to claim your prize.
And thanks so much to everyone who took the time to participate by sharing your biggest kitchen challenge. I loved reading all your comments and learning more about you.
Notes from The SweetHome review site on the best rice cooker (affiliate link)” After more than 100 hours of research and testing, cooking more than 200 pounds of rice, and talking with rice experts specializing in Japanese, Thai, and Chinese cuisine, we recommend the Hamilton Beach 37549 2-to-14-cup Digital Simplicity Rice Cooker and Steamer for most people.
It’s an outstanding value that’s well-suited to most households that want the ease and convenience of no-fuss, no-burning cooked rice.
It makes delicious short-grain and medium-grain white rice—the variety most commonly made in a cooker—faster and better tasting than models 10 times the price.
It offers features you tend not to see on rice cookers at this price, most notably a delay-start mode, stay-warm functions, an insulated lid to hold in steam, large capacity, and a heavy, quality cooking pot.
It’s by far the best low-priced cooker we’ve found.”
My biggest cooking challenge is cooking rice! No matter how careful I am and how close I watch cooking times, I manage to make it too mushy or I’ll be certain the time was perfect and it will have a crunch to it! Great giveaway!
My biggest cooking challenge is cooking for one.
Everything about cooking! If I had the money I would get someone to cook for me 🙁
I am totally recipe dependent and idea clueless, so I tend to make the same thing over again- and in bulk so I don’t have to cook every day.
My Biggest Challenge is trying to make comforting food that is not too fattening. I love casseroles and crock pot recipes. If something does not look comforting it does not appeal to me.
My challenge is pork and rice. I always tend to dry my pork. I am afraid to under cook it. Rice, I think the only time I could it is is when I baked it with chicken .
My biggest cooking challenge is using spices. I want flavorful dishes, but am hesitant to try different spices – I don’t want to ruin food and throw it away. I really would like some spice ideas for veggies.
My biggest challenge in the kitchen is cooking meat. The only meat that I’m inclined to cook is chicken, ground beef, pork chops and some fish. I don’t know enough about which part of the meat is better than another and what is the best way to prepare it.
P.S. That will be so fun to win a rice cooker since I don’t have one, but I have never been very lucky, but who knows this week could change. Thanks for all the information you willingly share on your website.
Mt biggest challenge is making dinner for only my husband and myself….I end up preparing way to much.
My biggest cooking challenge is actually having everything I need for dinner in my house and defrosted when I need them.
My biggest cooking challenge is making healthy meals everyone will eat. I cook for my parents, sister, brother-in-law, niece and great-niece. My parents and sister have special dietary needs so cooking something that fulfills all of the needs that everyone will eat is a challenge.