Brown Rice and White Rice, A Comparison.

Contributed by Food recipes, Thai food (Source)

Starting off with the external appearance, white rice is white because of the full polish that is given to the rice. Brown rice can be either fully brown or be a lighter shade of brown depending on the extent to which it has been polished or whether it has been polished at all. White rice has the husk and the bran layer removed from the seed whereas, brown rice retains the bran (fully or partially), the husk is ofcourse removed for brown rice as well.

Cooking white rice involves washing the rice and then cooking it, there is no need to soak the rice before cooking. Brown rice on the other hand, should be washed and then soaked in water for around 25 to 30 minutes before being cooked. Soaking is required for brown rice before cooking because, of the bran layer on top of the seed. The soaking process before cooking brown rice is meant to soften the bran layer on the seed.

If you compare the texture of brown rice and white rice after cooking, the brown rice will have a much firmer texture than white rice. It is this nutty kind of flavour that makes people love brown rice once they have tried it. White rice on the other hand gets a little more soft when cooked.

Brown rice has an appetising flavour of it's own, on the other hand white rice is often enhanced with other flavours. Some Asian countries have become experts in adding flavour and fragrance to white rice. This is very rarely done in the case of brown rice and the natural flavour of this rice is one of the reasons for it's growing popularity.

White rice has a longer shelf life as compared to brown rice. Brown rice develops a rancid flavour if stored unrefrigerated for more than 5 to 6 months. This is due to the natural oils in the bran layer becoming stale with time. It is something that you should remember especially if you are used to buying and eating white rice and have made a recent switch to brown rice.

Coming to the economics between brown and white rice, one would expect brown rice to be cheaper than white rice as it is rice that has not been completely polished. However, the truth is that brown rice is more expensive than white rice. The reason is possibly because brown rice despite it's growing popularity, has a total consumption that is less than white rice. The economies of larger production scale work in favour of white rice as far as pricing is concerned.

Much coverage has been given in this report to the health benefits of brown rice. If you had to compare brown rice and white rice on the basis of nutrition and health benefits, brown rice would surely come out the winner. For the health concious, brown rice would be the obvious choice as many health benefits of brown rice have been medically proved.

For More healthy food recipes visit http://theworldmosthealthyfoodsrecipes.blogspot.com/2011/10/workd-most-healthy-foods-recipes-index.html
For the world most healthy foods visit http://healthy-foods-index.blogspot.com/2011/03/healthy-foods-list.html