Do you need to wash rice before cooking it? - ABC Everyday (2024)

I have a culinary confession to make: I don't wash my rice.Never have. Maybe never will.

To be clear, I'm not someone who refuses to wash food on principle. I wash my leafy greens. I believe in E. coli. I own not one, but two salad spinners.

Likewise, I'm not some cookery kook who wasn't aware that people generally wash their rice. Nor am I an unadventurous anglophile who subsists solely on meat and three veg.

The reason I've never washed my rice is because I can't be bothered.

When I absentmindedly let this slip to my colleagues, I was met with reactions ranging from agreement to dismay to abject horror. It left me wondering: do we really need to wash our rice?

To find out, I turned to a gustatory idol of mine: chef, cookbook author, cooking school owner, and writer of my favourite rendang recipe of all time, Tony Tan.

It depends on what you're making

A quick examination of Australia's unique confluence of European and Asian diasporas means that, as a nation, we're ideally placed to question the necessity of washing our rice.

"Washing rice is actually a very cultural thing," says Tan.

"When you start to look at the Italians, as well as the Spanish, there's quite a bit of rice in their risottos and paellas.

"They don't really wash their rice because what they want to do is retain the [starch] that is essential in making sure the dish ends up tasting creamy.

"Whereas in Asian cultures, the tendency is always to wash the rice," Tan says.

The type of rice makes a difference too

Worldwide there are estimated to be more than 40,000 different varieties of rice. And while major supermarkets only tend to stock a handful of varieties, each requiresa slightly different approach to cooking. Take basmati for example:

"[Basmati] rice, that comes from the northern part of India and all the way through to Afghanistan, is a very long-grain rice and long-grain rice absorbs a lot of water," says Tan.

"So that's why [South Asian people] always tend to wash the rice first and then, after that, it soaks [in order] for the rice to expand."

Then there's tradition

Tan explains that traditionally, rice harvesting in Asia didn't involve any mechanisation. Even now, he says there are certain parts of Asian countries where families and communities don't have access to modern machinery.

"There will always be some husk left behind or some stones left behind, and that's another reason why they actually wash their rice," he says.

"There is a tradition behind it and, because of this, it becomes common practice for a lot of Asian cultures."

So, should you wash your rice?

For common Asian varieties, like jasmine or basmati, Tan washes it at least twice, if not three times, just to get rid of the starch.

For European varieties, like arborio or bomba, he leaves the rice unwashed.

Still not sure where that leaves you? Lydia Buchtmann, from the Food Safety Information Council, says there's no need to wash your rice as any bacteria will be killed as the rice is boiled.

"You might occasionally get a bit of grit, but that's pretty rare these days for commercial rice," says Buchtmann.

"It's also worth storing [uncooked rice] in air-tight containers to prevent pantry moths or other pests from getting in."

Washed or unwashed, it's important to store cooked ricecorrectly to avoid food poisoning.