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Rice, Boiled, for Curry
Patna rice ought properly to be used for curry, but when it is not at hand Carolina rice will do almost as well. Wash half a pound of rice in two or three waters, drain it, and pick out every discoloured grain. Season two quarts of boiling water with a little salt, sprinkle the rice into it, and let it boil with the lid of the saucepan partly off for thirteen minutes. Drain it on a colander, then put it into a buttered saucepan, cover closely, and let it remain by the side of the fire until each grain is perfectly tender when pressed between the thumb and finger, but still unbroken. Be careful not to stir the rice while it is boiling, and serve on a separate dish. Time, about twenty minutes. Probable cost, 3d. Sufficient for five or six persons. RICE, BOILED, FOR CURRY (another way). (See CURRY, TO BOIL RICE FOR.)
A pre-absorption method: the rice is boiled loose in a large volume of salted water, drained, then finished by residual heat. The technique still works, and gives drier, more separate grains than the absorption method.
- Patna and Carolina ricePatna is a long-grain Indian rice; basmati is its nearest supermarket descendant and is what to reach for. Carolina rice, once the standard American long grain, is now met mostly as a brand name, though the heirloom Carolina Gold has been revived; any long-grain white rice stands in.
- QuantitiesHalf a pound is about 1 1/4 cups of raw rice; two quarts of water is 8 cups. The generous water-to-rice ratio is deliberate, not an error — it keeps the grains moving and washes off loose starch.
- Washing mattersTwo or three changes of water, as the recipe directs, rinses off loose surface starch and helps keep the grains separate.
- Thirteen minutes is a starting pointTest early rather than trusting the clock: start checking at eight or nine minutes and drain when the grain is tender but still has a faint firm core; the steaming stage finishes it.
- By the side of the fireThis means gentle residual heat, not a burner. Set the covered, buttered pan on the lowest possible flame, or off the heat entirely with a folded towel under the lid, for 5 to 10 minutes.
- Do not stirStirring boiling rice breaks the grains and releases starch. Sprinkle it into the water so it disperses, then leave it alone.
- YieldFive or six as a curry accompaniment, which is fair — roughly two-thirds of a cup of cooked rice each.
Cassell's assumes curry as a settled part of the British dinner table, and the note that Patna rice "ought properly to be used" is often read as reflecting the Victorian import trade more than any Indian practice: Patna, on the Ganges in Bihar, gave its name to the long-grain rice that East India Company shipping brought to British grocers, and for decades "Patna" functioned in English cookbooks as a generic term for any dry, separate-grained rice. Carolina rice, the offered substitute, came from the Low Country plantations of South Carolina and Georgia, and its presence here as second-best marks the two great rice trades feeding the British kitchen in one sentence. The insistence on unbroken, individually tender grains served on a separate dish is generally taken to be an Anglo-Indian convention — the rice as a plain foil to the sauce, kept apart until the plate.