Cooking in China

Baking in a Rice Cooker?

Yes, it can be done. Surprisingly well too.

I love baking and 10 months without making cake or brownies or bread or something is a horrible thought. Since we have no oven, though, I thought this was to be my fate. Shortly after arriving here, I said to Eric, “I wonder if you could make banana bread in a rice cooker?”… And so it started. I googled it and found that other people have already had the same thought as me. I began experimenting. My first adventure was to make carrot cake. My only problem was that I did not trust the rice cooker to know when it was done. After about ten minutes, it switched from cook to warm. Of course that’s not long enough to cook a cake! So I proceeded to jam a chopstick in the switch to keep it on cook. Pretty soon, burnt cake smell was filling the apartment. Lesson one: Don’t jam a chopstick in the rice cooker power button to keep it cooking!

A few days later, and with tired hands from scrubbing the pan, I tried again. This time: rolls. French bread rolls- yum! And they turned out amazing. I let the rice cooker do its thing- letting it switch to cook and steam for a while and then switching it back to cook when it would let me. Result? Perfect, soft, delicious rolls.

So then it was back to cake. I was not going to let the rice cooker win with this one. Banana chocolate cake. I greased that pan like crazy, put it in, turned the switch, and crossed my fingers. About three cook/steam cycles later- perfectly moist cake! Success!

I have now tried quite a few things- cookies, apple bar cookies, and more cake. All wonderful! So far though I think our favorite has been my mom’s amazing bread recipe. It turns out incredibly delicious in the rice cooker. Eric and I usually sit down and eat half of it right away! So good!

Here are some of the recipes I have tried. They are normal recipes that can be made in an oven. Though if you have a rice cooker, I would definitely suggest you give it a try…

Carrot Cake

Ingredients:
2 cups + 1 Tbsp flour
2 cups sugar
2 tsp baking powder
1 tsp baking soda
2 tsp cinnamon
1 tsp salt
1 ¼ cup canola oil
4 eggs
2 tsp vanilla
3 cups grated carrots

Sift dry ingredients together. Add oil and beat for 2 minutes, slowly increasing speed. Add eggs and 2 tsp vanilla. Beat 2 minutes, scraping bowl. Stir in carrots. Pour into 2 greased round pans. Bake 45-50 minutes at 325. Cool 15 minutes and then turn onto rack.
** For cooking in a rice cooker, half the recipe and make sure the pan is well greased and floured.

Double Chocolate Banana Bread
From sisterscafe.blogspot.com

1 cup sugar
2 eggs
1/3 cup vegetable oil
1 1/4 cups mashed bananas (about 3)
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 1/2 cups flour
1/2 cup cocoa
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
1 cup semi sweet chocolate chips

1. Heat oven to 350. Spray bottom of 8x4 inch loaf pan with cooking spray.

2. Beat sugar, eggs, and oil in large bowl at medium speed until combined. Beat in banana and vanilla at low speed. Combine flour, cocoa, baking soda and salt in a medium bowl; beat into banana mixture at low speed just until combined. Stir in chocolate chips.

3 Spoon batter into pan. Bake 60-70 minutes or until toothpick inserted in center comes out clean. Cool 10 minutes. Remove from pan; cool completely on wire rack.

Florence’s Bread
About 9 c. flour ( I usually use 3-4 c. whole wheat) 2 tbsp. yeast
½ c. sugar 2 eggs
½ c. powdered milk ½ c. oil
1 tbsp. salt 3 ¼ c. warm water (about 120o)

Mix 3 c. of flour with other dry ingredients. Add liquid ingredients and mix well with spoon. Stir in as much more flour as you can with the spoon and then change to your hands. When you have a ball of dough, turn out onto a floured surface and knead until smooth and elastic, about 10 minutes. Place in oiled bowl; turn to coat with oil and let sit covered until doubled. Punch down and make into loaves. This recipe makes 3 large loaves or about 2 large pans of rolls. Let rise again and then bake at 375o for about 30 minutes or 20 minutes for rolls.

You can leave out the powdered milk and just use the water. Eggs can be left out as well if you don’t have them. If you cut the sugar when leaving out the milk and eggs to about 3 tbsp. it makes more of French bread type of bread.

French Bread Rolls
From mykitchencafe.blogspot.com

1 1/2 cups warm water (110 degrees F/45 degrees C)
1 tablespoon active dry yeast
2 tablespoons white sugar
2 tablespoons vegetable oil
1 teaspoon salt
4 cups all-purpose flour

In a large bowl, stir together warm water, yeast, and sugar. Let stand until creamy, about 10 minutes.

To the yeast mixture, add the oil, salt, and 2 cups flour. Stir in the remaining flour, 1/2 cup at a time, until the dough has pulled away from the sides of the bowl. Turn out onto a lightly floured surface, and knead until smooth and elastic, about 8 minutes. Lightly oil a large bowl, place the dough in the bowl, and turn to coat. Cover with a damp cloth, and let rise in a warm place until doubled in volume, about 1 hour.

Deflate the dough, and turn it out onto a lightly floured surface. Divide the dough into 12-14 equal pieces, and form into round balls. Place on lightly greased baking sheets at least 2 inches apart. Cover the rolls with a damp cloth (or greased saran wrap), and let rise until doubled in volume, about 40 minutes. Meanwhile, preheat oven to 400 degrees F (200 degrees C).

Bake for 12-13 minutes in the preheated oven, or until golden brown.