Rice: Brown vs. White

April 3, 2008

This is part one of my two part overview of rice.  You can get part two here. 

Rice is an important source of energy for much of the world, constituting 3/4 of the daily energy for Cambodians, and consumption increased in the U.S. substantially over the last half century. It surprised me to read that over 40,000 individual varieties of rice exist. At first this information spurred me to open Rice-Mart, my own rice mega-store, but I soon came to my senses and instead decided to write a two part overview of rice. Unfortunately I will not cover each of the 40,000 varieties, but hopefully this will help you when picking out rice at the store for a particular dish.

The first division among rice, and subject of today’s post, is between white and brown. Generally you can find rice in either form, although specialty varieties appear frequently in only one color.

Brown rice is unmilled, meaning the bran and germ layers remain on the grain. But what does this mean for you, the cook? Brown rice requires longer cooking times than white because the water first must penetrate the bran layer. In addition, these layers provide a chewy texture, a nutty flavor, and more nutrients.

Because brown rice is healthier, people (including myself) often prefer white rice. White rice is milled, removing the bran and germ layers, and polishing the final grain. You’ll probably see more specialty rices in the white variety, especially aromatics such as basmati and jasmine. Also, Asian sticky rices are usually white (although someone correct me if there is a brown sticky rice). White rice loses the nutrients that come with bran layer.

Of course, there is always an in between variety. This rice is parboiled before it is milled. Essentially, they heat the brown rice in or with water, dry it, then remove the bran and germ layers. The parboiling causes nutrients from the bran and germ layers to penetrate into the rice, making this rice healthier than plain white rice. This variety also comes with a slightly longer cooking time and nuttier flavor than white rice.

Stay tuned for tomorrow, when I break down rice into long, medium and short grain.

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