How to make white (parboiled) rice in Instant Pot

Last updated on March 3rd, 2021 at 10:08 am

White Rice in Instant Pot – an easy step-by-step method to cook parboiled white rice perfectly, every time. The resulting rice is soft but not too soft, it holds its shape beautifully and tastes delicious.

I spent the past month trying to cook more and more healthy food. I have been trying and it becomes difficult each day. With the playtime with my daughter and running around the house folding clothes (which is a lot by the way), I don’t have time to cook three or four times a day. As a matter of fact, I have time to cook once a day.

Even if I manage to go to the kitchen, my daughter makes up stories to make me go with her to the playroom. Which is really cute by the way! So, I decided to make some healthy snacks and freeze them. Actually, I made cheese corn balls, some mashed potato balls and broccoli cheese balls last Sunday and froze them.

See also:

Instant Pot Mushroom Curry recipe

I got to tell you, it was so much easier. My daughter and her friends loved eating them and then all I had to do was fry and serve it to them. Along with some ketchup of course (she loves ketchup like most kids out there). I’m planning to make some more and I’ll probably post the recipes here. Let’s see today’s recipe.

Perfect, soft parboiled white rice:

Sooo RICE!!! How many of you like rice? I ask this because I know there are quite a number of people who don’t like rice. And there are some who think rice is completely unhealthy and they avoid it. I’m no nutritionist so I’m not gonna even attempt to debate on whether rice is healthy or not.

See also:

INSTANT POT Chickpea Butter Masala recipe

But I can tell that rice has always been a staple in our South Indian household. I make it almost every other day, and when I don’t there’s always Dosa/Idli batter lying around in our refrigerator. So there’s always rice in one form or the other. Brown is of course healthier and more flavorful but if given a choice, I’ll always pick soft-cooked white rice.

There are tons of ways to cook white rice. I have been making rice for over a few years with my pressure cooker. But my recent favorite method is to make rice in Instant Pot so let’s get on to the details.

What is parboiled rice anyway?

Parboiled rice is partially cooked rice, mostly to make it easier to polish. But this process makes the nutrients to rush into the endosperm, making it debatably equally healthy compared to Brown Rice. If you’re curious, you can read more about it here.

This particular rice is parboiled Ponni rice. It is commonly available in Indian stores. Rice, in my opinion, makes for a great meal especially since rice is vegan, lactose-free and gluten-free.

Serving Suggestions:

People have rice all over the world. There’s rice in Italy, in Mexico, In Asia. So there’s like a gazillion ways to have your rice. Or I’ll tell you my favorite ways and you can have your pick. We South Indians like to have rice with curries; be it vegetable curry or meat-based curries.

See also:

INSTANT POT Chicken Biryani recipe

So much so that we make rice with curries almost every other day. And there are tons of different curries using every vegetable known to man. And then we get bored and make briyani out of rice and some other ingredients. Basically you can:

• serve with vegetable/meat curry
• make flavored rice like: Lemon Rice, Mint Rice, Cilantro Rice, Tomato Rice, etc..
• have it with roasted veggies and grilled chicken
• have it with your favorite Asian stir fry
• or go the Chipotle way and make Cilantro Lime Rice to go with Grilled Cajun Chicken, Corn Salsa, Guacamole, Tomato Salsa and a bunch of other toppings.

Storage:

White rice is excellent when made fresh. You don’t really have to make ahead, let alone refrigerate or freeze because it is so easy to make. However, you can make it about 8 hours ahead and have it cold or warm it up; it would taste nice.

However, if you made too much rice and you have a lot of leftovers, you can mix it with Tamarind Masala to make Tamarind Rice. It tastes soo good even the next day. Other ways are to dry them and fry them later.

See also:

INSTANT POT super-easy Chicken Masala recipe

Easy Mushroom Rice in INSTANT POT recipe

Split Pea curry / Indian Split peas recipe

Methods to cook rice:

The age-old method of cooking rice is to cook in a cooking pan or saucepan type vessel with enough water. Check for doneness and drain the water through a colander. This way the starch is removed; it is said that this is a better way of cooking. But time-consuming and you have to keep watch.

That’s where Pressure Cookers come in handy and especially the most loved Instant Pot range. It is preprogrammed and cooks to perfection.

But if you don’t have an Instant Pot, you can cook rice with regular Pressure Cookers. If you don’t have any type of pressure cookers, you can cook rice with the method mentioned above.

Cooking Rice in Instant Pot:

Like I mentioned before, this is the most fuss-free method to cook parboiled rice in instant pot. Let’s see how to make this.

• Measure 2 cups parboiled rice.
• Add the rice to the instant pot inner vessel.
• Measure 6 cups of water and pour it into the Instant Pot Bowl. This is with respect to the 1:2.5 cups ratio*.
• Close the Instant Pot with its lid and SEAL the vent.
• Set it to RICE mode (12 minutes AUTO).
• After 12 minutes, QUICK RELEASE to let the steam out.
• Open the lid and give a gentle stir with a wooden spoon/fork.
• Finally, serve the INSTANT POT White Rice hot with any of your favorite gravy or stir-fry.

Notes:

• WASHING: You don’t have to wash it, but if you’d really like to, add the rinse to a colander and rinse once under tap water. WASHING RICE TAKES AWAY THE STARCH
• SOAKING: This particular recipe is for cooking with raw unsoaked rice.
• White Rice: I’ve used a short-grain variety called Ponni Parboiled Rice here. Click on the ingredient for the product.
• Rice and Water Ratio: I’ve used a fairly aged white parboiled rice here so it cooks well with 3 cups of water; you can use this as a guideline. And reduce water the next time, if you see any water left. Or increase it if you find the rice undercooked (which means the rice is really old).
• Age of rice: Aged rice does not mean it is bad. As far as the flavor of rice goes, the flavor is enhanced as it ages.
• USE THE SERVING SIZE ADJUSTER, IN THE RECIPE CARD BELOW TO ALTER THE INGREDIENT MEASUREMENTS FOR AS MANY NUMBER OF PEOPLE YOU LIKE

Made this? Got doubts? Let me know what you think in the comments below!