Instant rice is a

white rice White rice is milled rice that has had the husk, bran, and germ removed. This alters the flavor, texture and appearance of the seed; helps prevent spoilage (extends its storage life); and makes it easier to digest. After brown rice is milled ...

that is partly precooked and then is

dehydrated In physiology, dehydration is a lack of total body water that disrupts Metabolism, metabolic processes. It occurs when free water loss exceeds intake, often resulting from excessive sweating, health conditions, or inadequate consumption of wate ...

and packed in a dried form similar in appearance to that of regular white rice. That process allows the product to be later cooked as if it were normal rice but with a typical cooking time of 5 minutes, not the 20–30 minutes needed by white rice (or the still greater time required by

brown rice Brown rice is a whole grain rice with only the inedible outer hull removed. This kind of rice sheds its outer hull or husk but the bran and germ layer remain on, constituting the brown or tan colour of rice. White rice is the same grain without ...

). This process was invented by Ataullah K. Ozai‐Durrani in 1939 and mass-marketed by

General Foods General Foods Corporation was a company whose direct predecessor was established in the United States by C. W. Post, Charles William (C. W.) Post as the Postum Cereal Company in 1895. The company changed its name to "General Foods" in 1929, a ...

starting in 1946 as Minute Rice, which is still made. Instant rice is not the "microwave-ready" rice that is pre-cooked but not dehydrated; such rice is fully cooked and ready to eat, normally after cooking in its sealed package in a

microwave oven A microwave oven, or simply microwave, is an electric oven that heats and cooks food by exposing it to electromagnetic radiation in the microwave frequency range. This induces Dipole#Molecular dipoles, polar molecules in the food to rotate and ...

for as little as 1 minute for a portion. Another distinct product is

parboiled rice Parboiled rice, also called converted rice, easy-cook rice, sella rice, and miniket (as predominantly called in West Bengal and Odisha in India, and in Bangladesh) is rice that has been parboiling, partially boiled in the husk. The three basic s ...

(also called "converted" rice, a

trademark A trademark (also written trade mark or trade-mark) is a form of intellectual property that consists of a word, phrase, symbol, design, or a combination that identifies a Good (economics and accounting), product or Service (economics), service f ...

for what was long sold as Uncle Ben's converted rice);

parboiled Parboiling (or leaching) is the partial or semi boiling of food as the first step in cooking. The word is from the Old French ''parbouillir'', 'to boil thoroughly' but by mistaken association with "part", it has acquired this definition. The w ...

to preserve nutrients that are lost in the preparation of white rice, not to reduce cooking time.

Preparation process

Instant rice is made using several methods. The most common method is similar to the home cooking process. The rice is blanched in hot water,

steamed Steaming is a method of cooking using steam. This is often done with a food steamer, a kitchen appliance made specifically to cook food with steam, but food can also be steamed in a wok. In the American Southwest, steam pits used for cooking ha ...

, and rinsed. It is then placed in large

oven upA double oven A ceramic oven An oven is a tool that is used to expose materials to a hot environment. Ovens contain a hollow chamber and provide a means of heating the chamber in a controlled way. In use since antiquity, they have been use ...

s for dehydration until the moisture content reaches approximately twelve percent or less. The basic principle involves using hot water or steam to form cracks or holes in the kernels before dehydrating. In the subsequent cooking, water can more easily penetrate into the cracked grain, allowing for a short cooking time.

Advantages and disadvantages

The notable advantage of instant rice is the rapid cooking time: some brands can be ready in as little as three minutes. Currently, several companies, Asian as well as American, have developed brands which only require 90 seconds to cook, much like a cup of instant noodles. However, instant rice is more expensive than regular white rice due to the cost of the processing. The "cracking" process can lead to a significant increase in broken grains in a package. Like all white rice, instant rice has nutrients removed that are present in brown rice, and soluble minerals can be lost when rice is rinsed; like white rice, the product can be enriched to restore B-vitamins and other nutrients. Instant rice has fewer of the

calories The calorie is a unit of energy that originated from the caloric theory of heat. The large calorie, food calorie, dietary calorie, kilocalorie, or kilogram calorie is defined as the amount of heat needed to raise the temperature of one liter o ...

carbohydrates A carbohydrate () is a biomolecule composed of carbon (C), hydrogen (H), and oxygen (O) atoms. The typical hydrogen-to-oxygen atomic ratio is 2:1, analogous to that of water, and is represented by the empirical formula (where ''m'' and ''n'' ma ...

, and

protein Proteins are large biomolecules and macromolecules that comprise one or more long chains of amino acid residue (biochemistry), residues. Proteins perform a vast array of functions within organisms, including Enzyme catalysis, catalysing metab ...

than regular white rice. The quicker cooking method can result in the rice being less firm in texture than regular rice, and the processing results in a loss of flavor.

References

{{Reflist Food science Grains Rice Instant foods and drinks