No, the process on the road here is to dry and separate the rice grain from the
inedible husk. It would be followed by 'winnowing' where the rice is thrown in
the air to allow the wind to blow away the light husks. The same process was
used in Europe to separate out wheat grains. The result is similar to what we
call 'brown rice' with all the goodness still there. The next process would be
polishing by tumbling to produce a white grain by removing the outer layers -
in the way that you might (or might not) peel a potato. The result is seen as
more refined (in both senses) and makes the rice an accompaniment which can
soak up a sauce, rather than a meal in itself (again, as with potatoes).
Finally the broken grains are sieved out - leading to my favourite Vietnamese
lunch - simply called Broken Rice here. The broken grains were sold cheaply to
the poor as second best but are now served with a pork chop, fried egg and 'bi'
(shredded pork, fat and/or gelatine) - I love the texture of the broken rice
grains in my mouth. I also like the very small grained rice I've found being
exported from Nepal and which is hard to find.
With full rice processing, the end result familiar to Westerners used to be
referred to as 'polished white rice' - the good stuff is already gone but the
process leaves a coating of powdery starch which means that it tends to stick
if cooked by absorption in a steamer, for instance. so it has to be washed
first. This was in the days before we all discovered the pleasures of Patna,
Basmati, Red Sambar and other different forms of rice and and the grains were
short and fat and used by my mum for rice pudding.
The really sticky rice used by the Chinese is a different variety which goes
soft in cooking and releases lots of starch. I don't think pre-washing would
make much difference.
I remember an apocryphal story about a medical team trying to work out why a
community of feaml monks were sickly while their male colleagues down the road
were robust. They concluded that it was because the males were not so damn
finnicky and did not bother to wash their rice or bought cheaper, less
processed rice
Andrew Fildes
afildes@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
www.soultheft.com
Author/Publisher:
The SLR Compendium:
revised edition -
http://blur.by/19Hb8or
The TLR Compendium
http://blur.by/1eDpqN7
On 16/04/2014, at 11:57 PM, Chris Barker wrote:
> Ho ho, Charlie. I think that that’s to remove some of the starch; some
> people in the west don’t like sticky rice.
>
> The trouble with husking rice, as I understand it, is that you will remove
> much of the goodness of the rice. I first realised this about 45 years ago
> and thought it ironic then: that subsistence farmers were removing much of
> the goodness of their staple crop.
--
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