Finest rice cookers 2023 for recent, fluffy rice

There are a number of components to contemplate when buying a rice cooker:

Dimension

Earlier than what’s obtainable, know what dimension it’s essential to assist steer your alternative. Rice cookers could be cumbersome, so take into account the obtainable house in your kitchen earlier than shopping for.

A 500ml cooker will produce as much as two parts, whereas the biggest on take a look at (6 litres) will make eight parts.

Glass or sealed lid?

A glass lid is often discovered on easier, cheaper fashions. This implies you possibly can watch the rice cooking, which is lacking on sealed fashions. Nonetheless, as rice cooking is kind of vigorous, the lids are likely to spit out water and steam on the edges, which could be harmful.

Sealed lids are sometimes solely on dearer rice and multi-cookers and often have a vent, making them safer and much much less messy.

Single-purpose

These machines are devoted to cooking rice solely, with just a few providing vegetable steaming and porridge capabilities. Single-purpose rice cookers ought to include directions for cooking completely different rice varieties and often embody a measuring cup for the rice and water in addition to a rice paddle. In case you prepare dinner rice usually and have room to retailer a machine, this feature may very well be for you.

Multi-purpose

A multi-cooker is usually a great space-saving machine because it rolls a number of capabilities – steaming, sluggish or strain cooking and extra – into one machine. Multi-cookers are dearer, however provide larger flexibility than simply cooking rice.

With many capabilities in a single machine, it might at first appear difficult, however this tends to get simpler with use. Nonetheless, when the multi-cooker is used persistently to prepare dinner strong-flavoured meals like curries and stews, or for air- or deep-frying, it’s going to finally taint the flavour of rice. Due to this fact, rice purists might desire a single-purpose cooker.

Fundamental rice cookers use a thermal sensor to find out when the rice is finished. When the contents of the pan go above a set temperature, the machine both turns off or switches to a ‘preserve heat’ mode.

High-of-the-range cookers use ‘fuzzy logic’ processors, that are programmed to make exact changes to cooking time and temperature in response to sensors within the cooker. For instance, the ambient temperature in a kitchen can have an effect on how briskly a rice cooker works.

In the identical manner {that a} chef would decrease the warmth below a vigorously boiling pan, a fuzzy processor will decrease the temperature of the rice cooker’s heating ingredient if the rice is cooking too shortly on a scorching day.

Fuzzy logic cookers usually have completely different programmes for various kinds of rice. Every program may have a novel heating/soaking cycle and temperature vary for optimum cooking.

Fundamental rice cookers are cheaper and produce good outcomes, significantly in the event you are likely to prepare dinner the identical kind of rice. Fuzzy logic cookers are higher at cooking completely different rices, however they’ve the next price ticket.

High quality of cooked rice: every cooker was examined with white and brown rice. We seemed for exact cooking that resulted in fluffy, clump-free white rice and al dente brown. The place obtainable, we used the ‘keep-warm’ perform to evaluate whether or not this was detrimental to the completed rice in any manner.

Security: we checked out how scorching the cooker acquired whereas cooking, the quantity of steam or spluttering from the lid and the cooker’s stability on the worktop, together with non-slip ft.

Multi-cookers: rice cooking and the completed high quality was our major concern, together with any particular capabilities for rice cooking, reminiscent of risotto. The cooker needed to be straightforward to grasp and use. We additionally examined the standard and ease of cleansing the inside pot, meeting of the cooker and the convenience of packing it away. Weight of carrying the multi-cooker was additionally essential to us.

Extras: helpful added extras, reminiscent of measuring cups, spoons, spatulas and colanders for rinsing, have been thought of. We seemed on the usefulness of additional capabilities, together with ‘delayed begin’ and ‘preserve heat’ capabilities.

Dimension: footprint and top relative to the capability was thought of. The comfort of hinged lids was weighed in opposition to the peak they took up when open.

Ease of use: we seemed for cookers with intuitive interfaces, straightforward to press buttons and responsive touchscreens. We seemed for clear instruction manuals with correct recommendation on water-to-rice ratios.

Equipment offers