Okay, so it isn’t rocket science or some new revolutionary breakthrough, but I’m pretty happy about my rice cooker.
Do I hear a “so what”?
So, this thing is awesome, convenient and let’s me stock up on incredibly cheap food with a minimum of effort. I went for the fancy model with an LCD timer control, stay warm mode and a huge cooking pot.
Along with the new cooker is a nice 20lb sack of long grain brown rice. I throw in the rice, throw in the water, shut the lid and press go. The thing will beep at me once to let me know it’s done. It will keep the rice hot for up to an hour and a half if I get a bit absent minded.
Hahahaha. It’s smarter than I am! Hmm, maybe I shouldn’t have admitted that part.
Anyway, the beauty of it is that for a few measly dollars and almost zero effort I’ve got a stack of single meal/serving containers of rice sitting in my fridge. Apparently they can last about a week, but if I make too much I can just freeze it instead.
The part I like best though is eating the stuff! It’s simple, fast, and good for you as long as carb meals are in your eating plan.
A sample meal… fry up some onions in butter, shred a bit of deli shaved ham, toss the ham in with the cooked onions. Throw a couple eggs into the mix, perhaps a dash of milk, stirring everything up. When the eggs are nearly done dump in the rice and mix well.
Change the veggies, change the meat, add more eggs, leave out the eggs, dump in some pasta sauce, or toss in a can of soup. Use up every leftover in the house, spice to taste, heat and serve in five minutes… cheap, cheap!
Anyhow, just wanted to give an example of something you can do to make it easier to prep a large amount of convenient quick serve foods.
Any automated kitchen appliance, such as a crockpot cooking away overnight while you sleep, really helps take the effort out of making food. They save you time and depending on what you cook can save your money too.
As a closing note, anyone care to share some favorite rice recipes?