Perfect rice made easy: if you eat a lot of rice, it's well worth getting a rice cooker.(Test: rice cookers)(Product/Service Evaluation)

Publication: Choice (Chippendale, Australia)

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COPYRIGHT 2005 Australian Consumers' Association

Does your family eat lots of rice? Or can you just not get it to cook perfectly on the stove or in the microwave? An electric rice cooker might be the answer.

Our test of 12 models shows they all make it very easy to cook perfect rice every time. You put in the rice and water, press a button and forget about it. When the water's been absorbed and the rice cooked, the cooker turns itself down to a warm setting that keeps the rice warm for up to 4-5 hours. When you're ready, you serve up nice fluffy, firm rice.

You may have to experiment a couple of times, depending on whether you like your rice a bit firmer or softer than the cooker produces with the recommended water-to-rice ratio. That's particularly true for the two models at the bottom of our table (see page 40).

Adding more water will increase the cooking time and produce softer rice; reducing the amount of water will produce firmer rice. But once you've found the ratio that's right for you, it'll be very easy to reproduce the perfect result.

With rice cookers there's little, if any, spillage, and the bowls have a non-stick coating, so they're less messy and easier to clean than a saucepan. They also save you stovetop space, and you can concentrate on cooking the curry or stir-fry.

If you have a model with a removable cord, you can leave the rice in the cooker to serve at the table.

But whether you put the rice in a separate serving bowl or serve from the rice cooker, don't use a metal utensil. As our (admittedly rather harsh) durability test showed, the non-stick coating of the bowls scratches relatively easily on most models.

WHAT TO BUY Only two of the tested models (the MAXIM and KAMBROOK) were a little disappointing at cooking rice compared with the others. Other than those two, there's very little difference between models, so you really don't need to spend more than $50 on a rice cooker and we've only recommended those costing up to that price. All you have to...

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