How To Cook Quinoa In A Rice Cooker

I am a big fan of quinoa recipes, and when I need to cook quinoa for a quinoa salad, I love my rice cooker.

Why Should I Cook Quinoa In A Rice Cooker?

Of course, you can also cook quinoa in a instant pot or regular saucepan. But a rice cooker is pretty close to your saucepan, except it makes rice and quinoa perfect every time. It comes out not too wet, not too dry, and it never sticks to the bottom of the rice cooker.

How To Cook Quinoa In A Rice Cooker

So let me share with you how I make the best quinoa, perfectly cooked in a rice cooker.

Ingredients

Raw White Quinoa – Red and black quinoa won’t cook at the same speed but use the same method and ratio of liquid to solid. Water – You can also use vegetable stock for a different taste. Olive Oil – Use extra-virgin olive oil or coconut oil to grease the rice cooker bottom and side. This is optional, but the quinoa will come out to its best every time with this little trick.

Optional Ingredients

You can add the optional ingredients below after cooking the quinoa in the rice cooker:

Salt Pepper

Washing Quinoa

Place the quinoa in a sieve and rinse the quinoa under cold water. This removes all the quinoa impurities and dust. You have two options for cooking your Quinoa. You can either cook the quinoa directly in the rice cooker or soak it before cooking.

Greasing The Rice Cooker

Now use coconut oil or olive oil and rub the rice cooker cavity. This is optional, but it guarantees that the quinoa won’t stick to the walls. Soaking quinoa enhances its properties. It also makes it easier to digest if you have a sensitivity to quinoa and removes some of the bitterness.

Adding Cold Water

Place 1 cup of quinoa with 2 cups of cold liquid. It can be water or vegetable broth. Close the lid of the rice cooker and push the rice button. If your rice cooker has a rice mode, it will start and stop by itself. Mine doesn’t have this option, so I set a timer to 15 minutes as soon as I start the rice cooker.

Cooking Time

Like brown rice and white rice, black quinoa and brown quinoa take a little bit longer to cook in a rice cooker than white quinoa. This is because the darker flavors have a thicker hull. However, the quinoa to water ratio is the same in the rice cooker. The ideal time based on quinoa color are listed below:

White Quinoa in a rice cooker is 15 minutes, not more, not less. Brown Quinoa needs another 3 to 4 minutes, so 18 to 19 minutes in total. Black Quinoa requires 5 to 6 minutes more or 20 to 21 minutes in total.

When the rice cooker stop, remove the lid, and the steam comes out. Then, fluff the quinoa with a fork and transfer it to a large serving dish to cool down, about 30 minutes, before using it in any quinoa recipes

How Much Quinoa Do I Get With One Cup?

One cup of uncooked quinoa makes 3 cups of cooked quinoa.

How To Make Quinoa Taste Good

Quinoa has a strong earthy flavor that some people don’t appreciate. Before you cook quinoa, you can soak it in cold water for 3 hours. It removes some of its bitter flavors. Then, cook the quinoa in a flavored liquid like vegetable broth or add tomato paste or seasoning to your water. You can also stir quinoa with a flavorsome salad dressing or add quinoa into a sauce-based recipe like in my Vegan Spaghetti Squash With Alfredo Sauce.

Storage Instructions

Cooked quinoa is perfect to meal prep a week of healthy meals. The recipes below marry very well with quinoa as a side: You can store cooked quinoa in a sealed container in the fridge for up to 4 days or freeze it for up to 3 months. Below are the most common questions about cooking quinoa in a rice cooker.