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No stress, no straining
Appears in
By Nisha Katona
Published 2017
A story that changed my riceless life came from a friend who worked in Africa. There, with very limited fuel, she told me they used one cup of rice to two of water, boiled the pan once, then placed the pan in a polystyrene box and left it to cook by itself. It did so in 20 minutes. No heat, no stirring, no straining.
I became swollen with awe at this assiduous grain. I cannot think of another ingredient that requires so little, to give so much to so many.
Rice swells to three times its size when cooked. It is the staple food of over half the world’s population. Its production alone keeps buoyant some of the world’s poorest economies. Quick to cook and slow to burn, rice is patient, rice is kind, rice is not proud, rice does not boast … biblical in its worthiness, I became a Rice Evangelist.