What to use instead of white rice
It depends entirely on what it's doing in the dish. Here's the job, what else does it, and what to skip.
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Neutral absorbent base under a saucy dish
Cooked starch soaks up the sauce and carries salt without adding flavour of its own, which is why it works under a stew that is already assertive.
Brown riceRan out
1:1 by volume, 2 1/4 cups water per cup, 45 min plus 10 min rest
Chewy with a bran flavour that competes rather than receding. It absorbs less sauce because the bran is a barrier.
QuinoaRan out
1:1 by volume, 1 3/4 cups water per cup, 15 min plus 10 min covered
Pebbly and slightly bitter unless rinsed hard. It sheds sauce rather than holding it, so the plate looks wetter.
Coarse bulgurRan out
1:1 by volume, 1 1/2 cups boiling water or stock per cup, covered 15 min off the heat
Ready in a quarter the time and nuttier. It absorbs a lot, so a thin stew ends up looking like a pilaf.
Riced cauliflowerRan out
1:1 by volume, sauteed dry in a hot pan 5 to 6 min
It gives off water instead of absorbing any, so a thin sauce spread over it thins out further on the plate.
What doesn't work: Riced cauliflower under anything brothy, like an etouffee or a red beans and rice. There is no starch to take up liquid, so the sauce you ladled over it pools at the edge of the plate and the whole thing tastes diluted.
Grain toasted in fat then simmered in stock
Coating each grain in hot fat before the liquid goes in slows water getting to the starch, which is what keeps a pilaf separate instead of creamy.
OrzoRan out
1:1 by volume, 2 cups stock per cup, 12 min covered
Toasts to a deeper brown and tastes distinctly of pasta. Thickens the last of the stock into a light sauce.
Coarse bulgurRan out
1:1 by volume, 1 1/2 cups stock per cup, 15 min off the heat
Nutty and looser. Almost impossible to overcook, which is the opposite of rice pilaf.
Pearled farroRan out
1:1 by volume, 2 1/2 cups stock per cup, 25 to 30 min
Chewy and firm throughout, and it stays that way when it cools. The stock ends up cloudy from the released starch.
Pearl barleyRan out
1:1 by volume, 3 cups stock per cup, 35 to 40 min
Releases a lot of starch, so the pilaf goes creamy at the edges. Sweet and very filling.
What doesn't work: Instant rice. It has already been cooked and dried, so toasting it in butter does nothing and twenty minutes of simmering in stock takes it straight past done into paste.
Starch that thickens a soup as it cooks in the pot
Amylose leaches out of the grain into the broth and thickens it, which is what gives avgolemono and arroz caldo body before the egg goes in.
OrzoRan out
1/3 cup per quart of stock, 9 min
Thickens faster and more. The soup keeps getting thicker as it sits, so serve it soon or hold back stock.
Short-grain or broken riceRan out
1:1 by volume
Thickens the most of anything here and goes cloudy. The grains give up their shape by the end.
Small pasta shapesRan out
1:1 by volume, cooked in the soup for the time on the packet
Thickens less than rice and the shapes stay distinct. They keep swelling in the leftovers and drink the broth overnight.
What doesn't work: Parboiled or converted rice in a soup you want thick. The starch has been set inside the grain during processing so almost nothing leaches out, and the avgolemono stays thin no matter how long it simmers, leaving the egg to do all the work.