Stovetop white rice, no cooker required

Long-grain rice by the absorption method: rinse, measure, boil, cover, and then the hard part, leaving the lid alone for 25 minutes.

yield: Serves 3 to 4
active: 5 min
total: 35 min
oven: not needed

Posted August 18, 2026

Ingredients

200 g (1 cup) long-grain white rice, such as jasmine or basmati
360 ml (1 1/2 cups) water
1/2 tsp kosher salt
1 tsp butter or oil (optional)

Method

Rinse the rice in a sieve under cold water, swishing it with your hand, until the water runs mostly clear. Drain well.
Put the rice, measured water, salt, and butter in a small pot with a tight-fitting lid. Bring to a boil over high heat, uncovered.
Stir once, cover, and turn the heat to the lowest setting. Cook 15 minutes. Do not lift the lid.
Turn off the heat and leave it covered for 10 minutes more.
Fluff with a fork and serve.

Notes

If the bottom scorches, your lowest setting runs hot. Next time use the smallest burner.
Brown rice needs more of both: about 540 ml (2 1/4 cups) water per cup of rice and 40 to 45 minutes.

stovetop-rice.sh19 lines, do not run

#!/usr/bin/env bash# stovetop-rice.sh: long-grain white rice, no cooker. serves 3 to 4.# exit codes: 0 fluffy, 1 crunchy, 2 gummy, 130 someone lifted the lidtrap 'echo "lid lifted. steam escaped. results undefined." >&2; exit 130' LIFTrinse rice:200g --until "water runs mostly clear"add rice water:360ml salt:0.5tsp butter:1tsp --to potboil --uncoveredstir --oncelid on && chmod 000 lid       # nobody opens this. not even you.heat --level lowest --for 15mheat offsleep 10m                     # the rice is still cooking. trust it.chmod 644 lid && lid offfluff --with forkserve

# The script is the joke. The ingredients and method are the recipe.