Cooking question - dried beans/brown rice

[Kassia]

Ds is coming home for the weekend and always brings his pressure cooker and I have beans and brown rice for him and he throws in some frozen broccoli.  He forgot the pressure cooker.  Is there an easy way to cook the beans/rice over the stove together or in the slow cooker?  Otherwise I have canned beans and instant rice (boil in bag) but I'd rather use up the other stuff.  

 

[Tanaqui]

I wouldn't cook beans and rice in the same pot, but you can certainly cook both of them on the stove! Brown rice takes about 45 minutes, a little less if you soak it first. Add a little more than twice as much water by volume as rice, and make sure the lid is on TIGHT. If you're not sure, crimp some foil on before you put on the lid. Beans... it depends on the variety of bean and, again, whether or not you've soaked it first. You don't need to measure the water first, just so long as there's a lot of it.

[KungFuPanda]

Soak the beans the night before, and just simmer them on the stove. You can follow the stovetop directions on the rice.  Alton brown has a pretty foolproof recipe for baking brown rice.  It’ll take more time, but it won’t really take more hands-on time. 

[heartlikealion]

I'm a reformed rice cooker person. I just use a metal pot now. Just use the right ratio of water/rice. I would do two separate pots, one for the beans and one for the rice. When I make red beans and rice, I usually don't combine them. I keep them in separate dishes and just serve the red beans on top of the rice. If you have one of those metal pots with holes set it on top of the other pot and steam the broccoli at the same time. You could also buy a steamable bag of brocolli as an alternative. 

I cook white rice so I have the ratios for that memorized. The brown rice ratio is a little different and one method some people use is the knuckle method. They don't measure the rice or water, they just put their finger in the water and determine the right amount of water based on where it hits a certain knuckle. I don't feel as confident in that method for myself. 

If you're using dry beans make sure you have enough time allotted. Soak them overnight. 

[J-rap]

I would separate them.  The rice will cook a lot quicker.  If you don't soak the beans overnight, there's another easy solution.  Put them in a pot of water (an inch or two over the beans), and bring to a boil.  Turn it off, cover, and let them sit for an hour.  That gives the same effect as soaking them overnight.  You'll probably still need to cook them on low heat for a few hours anyway if in a regular pot, or you can cook them all day in a slow cooker (probably 4-8 hours.... I can never remember how long depending on the type of legume.)  

We love beans and rice and eat them often!  I do prefer dried beans if I have time.

[heartlikealion]

This is the method I use for my white rice. I think you can do the same for brown, but just a different water to rice ratio: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-TaeYSiIbbw&t=75s

 

[mathnerd]

Soak the brown rice and beans overnight, separately. Drain the soaking water, wash thoroughly and cook both of them separately with fresh water. Soaking the brown rice makes it cook faster, otherwise it takes a very long time to cook.

Do you own an Instant Pot? 

[heartlikealion]

4 hours ago, mathnerd said:

Soak the brown rice and beans overnight, separately. Drain the soaking water, wash thoroughly and cook both of them separately with fresh water. Soaking the brown rice makes it cook faster, otherwise it takes a very long time to cook.

Do you own an Instant Pot? 

Oh yeah it takes longer than white rice — I was mistaken upthread. 

OP, this video may be better - specific to brown rice: 

https://youtu.be/MX6iBXal9ec

I always hear conflicting advice on rinsing rice (do it, don’t do it. Keep the starch, remove the starch). 

[Tanaqui]

Whether or not you rinse the rice is generally a cultural thing, and has a lot to do with what you want your rice to do. If you rinse the rice, you'll get rice where the grains don't stick together much. If you don't, it'll be stickier.

However, it's generally recommended to rinse brown rice because you greatly reduce the risk of contamination with arsenic that way. It's also recommended, so long as you're not using enriched rice, to rinse rice if somebody in your household needs a low-carb diet, because of course rinsing the rice reduces the starch.

[mathnerd]

7 hours ago, heartlikealion said:

Oh yeah it takes longer than white rice — I was mistaken upthread. 

OP, this video may be better - specific to brown rice: 

https://youtu.be/MX6iBXal9ec

I always hear conflicting advice on rinsing rice (do it, don’t do it. Keep the starch, remove the starch). 

Brown rice has higher quantities of arsenic than the white rice because the bran and outer coating harbors most of it. So, especially with brown rice, you are better off soaking, discarding the soaked water and rinsing  several times before cooking. 

[heartlikealion]

11 hours ago, Tanaqui said:

Whether or not you rinse the rice is generally a cultural thing, and has a lot to do with what you want your rice to do. If you rinse the rice, you'll get rice where the grains don't stick together much. If you don't, it'll be stickier.

However, it's generally recommended to rinse brown rice because you greatly reduce the risk of contamination with arsenic that way. It's also recommended, so long as you're not using enriched rice, to rinse rice if somebody in your household needs a low-carb diet, because of course rinsing the rice reduces the starch.

I never heard about water helping with that but if so, it should apply to white rice too? I remember concerns of arsenic in baby food rice etc. Occasionally I bought a certain brand of white rice because it was deemed safer than other brands (but cost more). 

[heartlikealion]

5 hours ago, mathnerd said:

Brown rice has higher quantities of arsenic than the white rice because the bran and outer coating harbors most of it. So, especially with brown rice, you are better off soaking, discarding the soaked water and rinsing  several times before cooking. 

Just saw this explanation after I posted. Interesting. 

[Tanaqui]

Brown rice does have higher concentrations of arsenic than white for the reason given. Additionally, if you're using *enriched* rice, rinsing just removes all the enrichments, aka, all the nutrients.

[mathnerd]

3 hours ago, heartlikealion said:

Just saw this explanation after I posted. Interesting. 

here is some explanation on arsenic in rice:

https://www.lundberg.com/arsenic-in-food

https://www.lundberg.com/faq/arsenic