Saturday, April 18, 2009

Meet the new rice cooker


Well, I have to admit that this is the very FIRST rice cooker that I bought for myself, in my life, so far. Celebrate, celebrate. It cooks up to six cups of rice. Thinking back, the other brand new one that I've received as a Christmas gift from my friend Jeannie was a miniature cooker with only a basic function to click and cook. It felt apart quickly. This one is different. It was made in Japan and with it, I get to choose to cook different grains of rice. Unlike myself, I dashed to one store without a second thought, skipped the comparing prices part, paid 4990 NT (over 100 USD)and grabbed it home.

The story was that I went to see this interesting traditional healer, or more or less a Chinese medical healer. He is not licensed to practice medicine and only advises people on diet. I told him my problem and he recommended brown rice with peaches and prunes for meals. He said that I needed more "solid" food. Besides advising against veggies and fruit from now on he also suggested more meat for my body.

According to him, I have to change my diet totally now. Rice is never my favorite and I prefer noodle over rice. As an Asian, it is somewhat rare that I do not even have a rice cooker in the house. I usually make one cup of rice and have it last for several meals. Sometimes, I even forget to eat it. And because I use a pot, not an Asian rice cooker to make rice, it does not come out that tasty. This has in turn affected my appetite for rice.

The other thing is that I have been somewhat scared of eating meat. The thought of the unknown amount of hormone and antibiotics injected to the meat makes me want to turn away from it. I've quit red meat for a while, and have been careful in selecting the types of fish or seafood that are marginally safe to consume.

I also have quit my favorite milk recently. I read that milk accelerates the formation of osteoporosis. Coffee is a no no for now and I only drink herbal tea containing no caffeine.

I am trying to stay away from food made of flour. Bread, cookies, crackers, pastries, and noodle are now rare visitors on my table. I only eat soba noodles.

I have to say that rice made out of a real cooker is unbelievably delicious and I am glad of my investment. But if eating meat can make me healthier, I'll try some.

7 comments:

  1. This comment has been removed by the author.

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  2. Ha!! Your rice cooker looks like a robot, even R2-D2! It looks very complicated! Does it do other things besides cook rice, like vacuum your floor, dust, grade papers?
    It's a discipline to eat only certain foods. Going organic is the big thing now here. We've been drinking only organic milk and eating organic eggs for several years now. The milk acutally tastes millions of times better!

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  3. The truth is, everything in excess is bad for your health.

    Rice is really good if you eat it with some spices or souces. Like making a creamy souce and covering the rice with it. ♥

    My advice for you is: don't avoid eating anything you can eat. There is nothing worse then not being able to eat something because you are allergic, for exemple.

    The red meat is quite dangerous, but only if you eat it everyday. I'm trying to eat it at least once a week, and eating more white meat and salmon.
    Milk... I have a slight intolerance, since I was younger. But I stubbornely drank milk everyday until it started to get inconvenient. :(

    http://www.whfoods.com/ check this website before choosing what you are not going to eat. It's very dangerous to stop eating something which gives you vitamins no other food might have.

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  4. Thanks, Amanda, for sharing your insights. Wishing everyone well and healthy.

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  5. we have an old Cuisinart one that does the job, but tends to crisp a little bit too much on the bottom. One like yours is in our plans but we'll probably wait until the Cuisinart quits on us.

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  6. Good idea to wait till it quits on you, Jeff. I can see how you will enjoy rice so much more with a fashionable rice cooker.

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