Brown Rice

Brown rice. I eat it now.

Growing up I ate rice almost every day. It was the side dish I could rely on. Say we were having chili for dinner. White rice wasn't just on the side, the chili was spooned on top of it. Or let's say we were having some kind of chicken dish, with vegetables. White rice on the side. Better yet, a roast with potatoes. White rice on the side. There were rare moments that I did not eat rice at dinner. When I went to college my mom gave me a rice cooker. Receiving a rice cooker as a gift from your mother is a shared experience of many of my Asian friends. What I didn't know about rice until I got to college, however, is that it also came in brown. I know! You might be laughing. But really, my only touchpoint for rice was white sticky rice. Bought in 20 or 50 pound bags. I will admit that one time I was spending the night at my friend's house when I was in middle school, and during dinner there was rice. I remember thinking, "Oh! something familiar!" and I kept a lookout for the shoyu (that would be soy sauce). But the shoyu never arrived at the table, and in its place was a pat of butter and salt. I was obviously perplexed. Also, the rice kind of slipped around on itself. Not sticky at all. And it came from a box!!

So, enter my undergrad experience and I'm walking through the cafeteria line and there it is. A big cooked bin of brown rice. And I think, "does it taste different? Looks unnatural." Again, I know! So weird. I have to laugh about this now. These days I have to sneak in my white rice every once in a while because apparently brown rice is better for you (and more natural?). And we pretty much only buy brown rice these days. Even though it takes like, an extra 25 minutes to cook. But every once in a while I can make the case for white rice and oh, I am so happy to gobble it up with just a drop or two of shoyu and some nori.