welcome to hot thai kitchen so today i am so excited to be sharing with you all the ways
that i know to make thai sticky rice now i've made sticky rice a few different ways over the
past several years on the show but today i want to do a complete round up a complete guide of seven
different ways that you can do it yes seven so it doesn't matter if you don't have this tool or that
gadget you don't have time or you have time one of these ways is going to work for you before i start
if you've never experienced the joy of thai sticky rice or what we call kao niew you have got to try
it it is so good and so thai sticky rice comes in a bag like this and it's usually labeled glutinous
rice or thai sweet rice even though it's not sweet you want to make sure that it is from thailand
and the grains are going to be sort of medium length and opaque let's get started so regardless
of which method you choose the first step is exactly the same for all of them and is absolutely
necessary and that is washing the rice you want to wash off the excess starch that's left there
by the milling process and then swish it around pretty vigorously so see how cloudy that water is
if you don't wash it it would be like cooking rice with a pinch of flour in it so you can imagine how
that might gum up your rice right so you want to rinse that off and do it a few times until the
water runs relatively clear so now that our rice is washed let's move on to the cooking methods
now the seven different methods can be divided into two categories the soak and steam methods
and the no soak method so let's start with the soak and steam methods because that's the more
traditional way i just love the smell of rice even when it's not cooking it smells so good to me all
right so soaking the rice you just want to take room temp or cold water you want to do this for a
minimum absolute minimum of three hours i like to do four because if your rice is old for example
it might be a little drier might need a little extra time you can do it overnight up to
12 hours however if you go long when you're done the the soaked rice will be quite brittle
so you have to kind of handle it gently when you're going to cook it afterwards all right
now if you can leave it out at room temperature it'll be totally fine but if you're nervous and
you're going to go like 8 hours 12 hours you can stick it in the fridge not a problem at all
so the first one is to use a traditional bamboo cone steamer or in thai we call what so this
is made specifically for making sticky rice even though you could steam whatever you want inside
of this you want to add just a little bit of water in here you don't want to add too much
because this cone goes in pretty deep and you want to leave a good amount of space between the water
and the cone so that when it's boiling vigorously it doesn't touch the bottom of the rice so i would
say like one and a half inch of water is plenty and with the bamboo cone you want to soak this
in water first for like 10 minutes or so just to get it wet so that it will not stick to the
rice when it's done and the great thing about this method is it doesn't matter how much rice you use
you don't have to measure any water you don't have to use cups use finger method nothing you
just put an amount of rice in there and that's it i'm going to be making a lot of rice today so i'm
only going to do a little bit per method otherwise we'll have rice out the wazoo by the end of this
if you have a bamboo type lid it would be better because this will not condensation will not drip
back onto the rice but like pot lids are totally fine so once the water is vigorously boiling
this goes on top and you put your lid on and it could be this lid and then we're going to steam
this for about 25 minutes but we're going to flip it halfway through and i'll show you how
that's done when the time comes so the rice is kind of partially done now there we go
try to like okay there we go yay and then we put it back on for another 10 minutes
and then that is beautifully cooked sticky rice you just loosen it up and then roll it onto
a plate which is a cute little lump of rice oh my god look how beautifully perfect that is
oh it's perfect look at that the grains beautifully intact there's no soggy grains
anywhere nice and dry this is why the bamboo cone steamer is the traditional method it really makes
perfect rice one power tip once you're done with this you want to get it soaking in water
immediately there's a little bit of gooeyness from the rice left on there if you leave it to dry
it'll be impossible to clean off so this do not delay the cleaning
if you don't have a fancy bamboo steamer any steaming rack will do it can be one of these it
could be one of these this is a rice cooker insert actually any steaming rack so you're also going to
need some sort of a cloth so i use muslin you want to use natural fiber because it's food it's going
to be steamed you're probably going to eat some lint so you know you don't want to use synthetic
materials you want to soak this first which i almost forgot to do you want to get this wet
otherwise it will stick to the rice when it's done which i learned the hard way i actually
like to do a donut trick which means i put a little shot glass or something in the middle
and then i put the rice on and then you take the cup out yes that says adam's bar adam
doesn't actually have a bar it doesn't have to be perfect is it makes the rice cook more evenly
because i find if you make a big pile sometimes the middle will be a little bit undercooked and
this way it'll cook faster too and then you want to make sure you leave space around the edges so
don't block the entire rack so that you have plenty of room for steam to come up and then
you just steam this for again about 25 minutes 30 minutes if you're doing a lot and with this
method especially with the donut trick you don't have to flip it like we do with the cone steamer
careful it's hot and the good thing about the soak and steam method is you can't really
overcook it in a bad way like if you let it go a little too long whatever like nothing bad is
going to happen so it's a really great fool proof method ta-da look at all sticky rice doughnut
the bottom of the rice where it's touching the cloth can get a little bit gummy but
i don't find like once you fluff it up and mix it in i don't find that's a big deal at all
perfect and if you really don't have any steaming implements you surely have some sort
of a sieve okay well a metal sieve anyway don't do this with plastic stiff and again you put a
little bit of water at the bottom make a little divot on the on in the bottom so that you know
the rice is more evenly distributed close that up and off you go to the stove same deal
plop that a little bit less graceful a little bit stuck here on the stiff let's look at the bottom
oh that's not too bad it turned out really well sometimes i find this method has a bit
of a socky bottom as well but this one worked out really well so there you go
three different methods for any kind of equipment so there is a fourth soak and steam method
that produces extra soft sticky rice and this involves just one little extra step of steeping
your soaked rice so this is soaked washed and drained and you just pour off the boil water
over it and then you let it steep for about 10 minutes before draining and then just steaming
as usual and you can seam this anyway that we discussed and this is a really useful method
if you know that you're gonna serve this rice at room temp so maybe it's like a potluck where
food's gonna kind of be sitting out or a picnic or something sticky rice when you just steam it
dries out really quickly so this is a really handy method for this the rice will stay soft
even if it's not warm anymore and this works because you're basically forcing the rice
to absorb just a little bit more water so when it cooks up it's more tender let's take a look
if we can see any difference between the one that's been steeped so i don't know if you can see
this on camera but you can to me it's very obvious that the rice grains are a little bit bigger and
it's softer i prefer it to be a little bit on the chewier side but again if you're not going to eat
that hot this is the way you want to do it because this will not go hard or dry if it cools down so
at this point i just want to touch on why we like to soak and steam sticky rice and not just stick
it in a pot with water like you do any kind of rice so the reason is sticky rice can only absorb
a small amount of water that's why it's so dense when it's cooked right and so if there's any extra
water that it can't absorb sitting there it'll turn the rice mushy really quickly it's also
really sensitive to boiling water so if you boil a pot of water put the rice in the outside will mush
before the inside cooks through so by soaking the sticky rice you allow the rice to absorb
all the water that it possibly can you take it out of water and then steam it so this way
there's no chance you can overcook it because you can't add too much water to that right
so to look at another way with regular say jasmine rice the rice absorbs water and cooks at the same
time but with sticky rice you let the rice absorb the water first and then you cook the water
that's already in the rice having said that it is possible to cook sticky rice in water it's just a
little bit trickier but these are the methods we're gonna look at next before we move on i'd
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for an annual subscription so the first no-soak method is what i call the steam the bowl method
and i got this idea actually from my mom who used to use it to cook her own personal bowl of brown
rice when the rice cooker was busy with white rice so what you want is a steamer for this but instead
of the rack steamer i just want to show you an alternative way if you have a big stock pot you
can get one of these steamer racks you can get at asian grocery stores for like a couple of bucks
now you can use a regular pot lid but i like the bamboo lid because then there's no risk of
condensation falling into the rice you can also just cover the rice bowl with foil or something
the rice has already been washed again you want to wash all the rice and drained really really
really really well not just like pour it off oh yeah that's good no you want to drain and shake
and make sure there's no extra water and then you want to add water at the ratio of one part rice
to two-thirds water so less water than rice so the water is boiling i'm gonna turn it off so i
don't steam burn myself because i have to put this bowl into and this will take a little bit longer
so 25 to 30 minutes for this one okay so the top of it you can see looks a little bit mushy
and the no soak method is always going to be less ideal than the soap method we look at
the bottom yeah it's a little bit softer i could probably add a little bit less water to this one
but that's the thing with cooking sticky rice in water is you have to be super precise and not a
little bit more or you make the rice a little bit too soft the next method is the rice cooker method
what you can do it in the rice cooker why do we bother with anything else at all well that's
because not all rice cookers can do a good job it will work if your rice cooker cooks at a slow
and gentle pace so i had one years ago that did an okay job with a little bit of crispiness at
the bottom then the previous one that i had did not do a good job at all but then this
one that i have the zojirushi which i've done a review for i'll link to that below does a perfect
job i was so surprised how well it does and it has a special function for that the sweet
rice function and sweet is just another term for sticky rice you start with washed rice obviously
but you have to drain it really really really well the ratio is the same two-thirds part of
water going in there one very important note you do not use the sweet rice line in the pot
because that is meant for japanese short grain sticky rice if you've got a cooker that has
a brown rice function it might work better so try that we choose the sweet function and then
so this you'll notice takes a quite a long time for that amount it takes 35 to 40 minutes but
that's why it turns out so well because it cooks at such a slow and gentle pace let's take a look
the grain looks perfect it's almost steamer good the bottom of the pot has a hot the bottom of
the pot has a little bit of like a little bit of like a whiteness like parts that's a little
less translucent once you fluff it and mix it in you can't really tell because it's so slight
it's pretty amazing like if you didn't tell me i thought you just cooked this
in a steamer this rice cooker does a really really good job
it's a little bit maybe a little bit softer than the soak and steam method here adam
what do you think it's a tiny bit more moist than the traditional method the first method
right it's a little bit more dry than the bowl method got it yes yes last and actually at least
because this is the least ideal method and that's the microwave it works but i find it
kind of fussy more so than all the other methods and also each microwave's a little different so
this is something you're gonna have to play around with your machine a little bit so i've got my rice
here washed and drained and the first thing we're going to do is we're going to do a quick
soak in hot water so i'm just going to cover it and let it sit and let it sit for 15 minutes
it has been 15 minutes i'm gonna drain this rice again really really really really really well and
then i'm gonna add fresh water at the same ratio of one part rice to two-thirds water now could i
have just measure the water and use that soaking water and just microwave it directly without
draining and adding new water yes you could you're probably going to add need to add a little bit
more water than that which i haven't tried exactly here's the trick i have never used this microwave
before at my place with a 900 watt microwave i do it for three minutes stir two minutes stir and
then one minute and then it's done so three two one this is an 1100 watt so who knows so i'm gonna
do two to one and then see what happens you wanna cover it with something some people use saran wrap
but i don't like the idea of microwaving saran wrap so a plate will work just fine
so the rice is gonna be still raw obviously but i'm gonna give it a stir just to redistribute
looks like it this could have also done a three minute initially but it's all right we'll do
two more minutes okay oh that's a lot of steam inside oh it's looking all right you can see that
it's dried up a little bit but you can see some whiteness on the inside of the grain so you wanna
fold the bottom up to the top okay i think one more minute and this should be good
i think that could use another minute so maybe i should have done a three two one after all
but i'm gonna do a stir oh but the bottom the bottom looks good though so maybe
all it really needs is to just like be stirred and just sit and you know rest in its own heat
so this is the microwave rice it's been sitting for a few minutes so let's see
some reason it's less flavorful than the other rice i know the microwave zapped flavor out of
it or something i don't know it just feels that way yeah i don't like it as much as
the uh the one we just did i can't explain why honestly it feels like the outside is
softer like it's not overcooked but the outside is a little bit gummier you're right
and that goes to show you what i was talking about about the rice
really needing gentle heat otherwise the outside will be mushy before the inside cooks through
but with the microwave it's pretty quick right it's like pretty high heat in there so that's
why you get this like sort of gummy situation between the rice grains so it's it's not ideal
but it works and that is it i am now so hungry because i've been making sticky rice all morning
and eaten nothing of it so i'm gonna go and eat sticky rice with these chicken wings which by the
way sticky rice goes great with wings with fried meat grilled meat anything that you use your hands
skewers of stuff even thai salads and you just dip the rice in the salad i'll link to some recipes
that go well with sticky rice below if you have other sticky rice making now that's that i don't
know about please share with us in the comments below and subscribe to the show if you like it and
i will see you next time for your next delicious thai meal with hopefully less sticky rice
you