How to Cook Brown Rice – Brown rice is notorious for taking too long, being underdone, or overdone. Forget the rice cooker, all you need is an oven. Learn how to cook brown rice perfectly with this recipe.
Learning how to cook brown rice is an essential skill for a healthy household. At least once a week, I bake off a batch of brown rice since we made the switch away from white rice in our house. That’s right, I said bake. This recipe is so foolproof, that I use it instead of the 200 dollar Japanese rice cooker I own.
There is only one trick to this recipe, using boiling water or broth. We use broth and butter for more flavor, but water is a great option for those looking for a classic brown rice recipe. As long as you boil your water first I promise you this method for cooking brown rice will not fail you.
How to Cook Brown Rice
Wondering how to cook brown rice perfectly every time? Brown rice is notorious for taking too long to make, being underdone and crunchy or overdone and mushy. You will never have that experience again if you follow these sage instructions from Alton Brown. Yes, Alton Brown. You ready for it?
You combine 4 ingredients, put it in a 375-degree oven for an hour and you have perfectly cooked brown rice. That’s it. This is a recipe of his from a decade ago and I’ve been making it for almost that long.
Baked Brown Rice Recipe alterations
I have changed a few things on occasion. Sometimes I use stock instead of water, sometimes no butter or with fresh herbs from my garden. But do not change the timing, temperature and the fact that you start with a boiling hot liquid.
One of my favorite variations of this rice is to boil off skinned dark meat for 30 or so minutes. Then, use that water to flavor the rice. Put the chicken in the pan with the raw rice and stock and let it cook for an hour. Let your imagination go with this dish, but when you need a simple brown rice recipe, pull this out of your recipe file.
Perfect Every Time Brown Rice
Ingredients
- 1 1/2 cups long grain brown rice
- 2 1/2 cups water
- 1 teaspoon unsalted butter
- 1 1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 375 degrees.
- Place the rice into an 8-inch square or circle baking dish.
- Bring the water to a boil, add salt and butter to the saucepan. Add the water to the rice and just jiggle the pan a bit to make sure the rice is evenly distributed.
Cover the pan and bake for 60 minutes.
- After an hour, remove from oven and let sit a couple of minutes. Take off the cover and fluff the rice with a fork.
Recipe Notes
Recipe adapted from http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/alton-brown/baked-brown-rice-recipe.html
This was by far the best brown rice I have made. My husband commented that it was as good or better than our favorite Asia restaurant‘s side I would like to add chopped onion and mushrooms to this recipe on occasion. Would you recommend this addition and do I sauté the vegetables first?
Yay! I’m glad you love it so much. Adding onions and mushrooms sounds amazing but you’re right, you’d want to sauté them first otherwise they’ll soak up more of the liquid and your rice will be crunchy. Enjoy!
This is the best brown rice I’ve ever made, normally it gets to mushy for me. I do think my oven runs a little hot so I had a few crunch grains but I’ll play it till it’s perfect. Thanks for sharing your recipe ?
Can Minute Brown Rice be used?
No
Ive made this a few times now and my rice comes out just a bit on the firm side. Also, if I try to put leftovers in my fridge they always get crunchy. What am i doing wrong?
Sounds like it might have been too hot in the oven. Have you checked if the temperature is accurate? If so, you might have a hot spot. Next time, double check the liquid amount is correct and ensure the foil has a tight seal around the dish so steam isn’t able to escape. I hope this helps!
If using par boiled brown rice, how many minutes to bake do you suggest?
That would completely change the timing. I would recommend following the instructions on the package just use broth in place of the water amount.
This worked great. We just got a glass-top stove and I HATE it cuz if anything boils over it’s an absolute mess. So this will be my go-to! Thanks!!
Wonderful! I think going to oven baked made a huge difference for me too in how often we enjoy brown rice now too. Plus no more guessing on if it is cooked enough.
Love this recipe. Could I half it? What would be the baking time?
You can definitely halve it. The cook time is the same, just remember to use boiling hot water 🙂
This will be so much better than making it in my rice cooker. Can’t wait to try it!
Enjoy!
Thank you.
You are a lifesaver
I want and need to eat more healthy and I love rice. Thank you so very much ??
You’re welcome! Thanks for the 5 stars.
I love this method! Turned out great!
Yay, thanks for coming back to let me know.
Just like you said, this rice comes out perfect every time!
My go-to brown rice recipe…it’s perfect and delicious every single time! 🙂
I’m so glad you love it too!
This is the BEST brown rice you’ll ever have!! Such an awesome hack! Thanks so much for sharing!
You’re welcome, Chelsea!
This turned out perfectly and I”ve been trying for years to find how to have a reliable way to make well cooked fluffy brown rice. Thank you.
You’re welcome, Pat!
Used low sodium chicken broth gave it great flavors. Was awesome thanks for sharing!
So glad you enjoyed it!
Sabrina, your chicken recipes have become my go-to recipes after what has become so many years of boring meal planning! Thank you so much! I would like to know how you would suggest I could tweak your oven-prepared brown rice recipe to make it a pilaf, utilizing orzo pasta in addition to the brown rice.
I’m sorry but it wouldn’t work using this method.
Do you rinse the rice prior to this method?
No need to rinse before.
I also have a rice cooker that I never use. I usually have the need to sauté some onions and garlic with my rice (especially with white rice), and I can’t do that in the rice cooker, so I gave up on it! lol
Yup I do that all the time too, haha!
What kind of brown rice is used?
I used long grain brown rice.
I never use my $200 rice cooker either, but I love the $20 one and use it all the time.
My 200 dollar one is in the garage, but the slow cooker gets used all the time. And I am not even cooking for Harpo! I’ve been baking rice a lot recently since I have other things in the oven already.
I am just making this now. I NEVER can get rice right, as well as many other dishes. I do seem to do better using the oven. I have high hopes for this oven rice recipe! I have a question. Is it 50 min or 60? Intro says 50. Instructions say 60….????????
It’s going to be 60 minutes, depending on your oven. You can check at 50 minutes just to be sure. Good luck and I would love to hear how it turns out!
I usually rinse my brown rice to remove excess starch…. Do I still rinse my rice before putting it in the pan…. No one has mentioned that and I find rinsing the rice makes a HUGE difference.
You can still rinse the rice.