How To Cook Brown Rice - Japanese Style

Wash the rice: Firstly, add 150g of brown rice per person to a large bowl and wash it under a running tap by swirling the rice around. Drain the murky water and repeat a few times until the water runs clear. Once the rice is clean, add the rice and water to a saucepan in a 2:3 ratio. Leave it for 2-3 hours minimum.

Boil the rice: Now place the lid on the saucepan and heat over a medium flame. When the water boils, turn the heat down to a low flame. Make sure that you don’t remove the lid at all for the next 15 to 20 minutes while the rice simmers and absorbs the water.

Steam the rice: Turn off the heat and allow the rice to steam, with the lid still on, for at least ten minutes. Leave for longer if you prefer a mushier consistency. When it has finished steaming, remove the lid, fluff the rice up with a rice paddle, and serve.

Turn it into sushi rice: To make sushi rice, the cooked rice needs to be mixed with sushi vinegar, which is Japanese rice vinegar mixed with salt and sugar. Mix 80ml of sushi vinegar (or about 12% of the total cooked rice weight) with the rice. To get the best flavour, the vinegar needs to be folded into the rice while it is still warm. As you are mixing the rice and vinegar together, use a fan to cool the rice and remove the moisture. Your sushi rice is now ready to be used in all types of delicious sushi. For best results use a wooden sushi bowl (sushi oke) to mix and cool the rice.