Mar 212 min read

Jeera Rice Recipe

Updated: Jun 15

Jeera or Cumin rice is a very delicate dish, some people just use the cumin seeds on their own while others lavish it with whole spices, I'm just going to add a few aromatic spices to this and some sliced onions. To cook this I am going to use the 'absorption method' the great thing about this method is that you can vary the texture of the grains by adjusting the water content, using a ratio of one cup of water to one cup of rice 1:1 you will get a rice that is al dente and the grains will separate easily after a while if left in a warm place.

Water to rice cooking ratios:

on a quest to cook the perfect accompaniment with this Jeera rice recipe I decided to do some experiments and something I discovered were these ratios, and not so much cooking times, but the water absorption.

This is based on basmati rice.

I think I'll spend an afternoon just cooking rice and showing my findings but basically a ratio of 1:1 will give a very aromatic al dente texture which I think is perfect for Indian rice. A ratio 1.5 : 1 will give a medium soft, slightly sticky rice and a ratio of 2 to 1 will be sticky rice a bit like Thai and Chinese. More on this later in the blog.

Serves 4 people

Preparation time 10minutes, cooking time 30 minutes,

Recipe Difficulty level - Beginner-Friendly

Special equipment - none

Jeera Rice Recipe

Ingredients:

1 cup of basmati or long grain rice
1 and a half cups of water
½ onion thinly sliced
1 tablespoons of butter
1 tsp of cumin seeds (Jera)
4 cardamon pods split open
2 cinnamon sticks broken
2 bay leaves
1 tsp Himalayan or Celtic sea salt

How to cook Jeera Rice

Click here for Kitchen Timer

Step 1:

Wash the rice in cold water to wash out most of the starch and any impurities, then cover the rice with water and briefly soak, whilst you prep the rest of the ingredients. Once the rice has soaked rinse again.

Step 2:

In a pan with tight fitting lid melt the butter and add the cumin seeds until they crackle then add the sliced onions and cook until the onions are soft.

Step 3:

Add the whole spices and briefly fry. Now add the rice and stir so that all the butter coats the rice grains.

Step 4:

Pour in the water and and salt, and bring to the boil for a minute or two, then give one last good stir.

Step 5:

Place the tight fitting lid and reduce the heat to the lowest level possible. Set a timer for 15 minutes, when the timer goes off remove the pan from the heat. Set another timer for 15 more minutes, try not to lift the lid during this cooking process.