Parboiling
Partial cooking of food in boiling water
Parboiling (or leaching) is the partial or semi boiling of food as the first step in cooking. The word is from the Old French parbouillir, 'to boil thoroughly' but by mistaken association with "part", it has acquired this definition.
The word is often used when referring to parboiled rice. Parboiling can also be used for removing poisonous or foul-tasting substances from foods, and to soften vegetables before roasting them.
01Basic technique
The food items are added to boiling water and cooked until they start to soften, then removed before they are fully cooked. Parboiling is usually used to partially cook an item which will then be cooked another way such as braising, grilling, or stir-frying. Parboiling differs from blanching in that one does not cool the items using cold water or ice after removing them from the boiling water.
02Parboiled rice
Sometimes raw rice or paddy is dehusked by using steam. This steam also partially boils the rice while dehusking. This process generally changes the colour of rice from white to a bit reddish. This type of rice is eaten in the districts of Udupi and Dakshina Kannada of Karnataka state, in the state of Kerala, and in most parts of Tamil Nadu, Bihar, and West Bengal in India. West Africa and the Afro-Caribbean diaspora are also accustomed to parboiling rice.
Sources and credits
This article is adapted from the Wikipedia article “Parboiling”, written by its contributors and licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0. Fathomly has changed the layout, removed citation markers, navigation and maintenance notices, and adjusted punctuation. This adapted version is shared under the same license. For references, see the original article.
Images, from Wikimedia Commons:
- Parboiling peaches.jpg by Benny Mazur, CC BY 2.0
- Famiole sbollentatura.jpg by Prof.lumacorno, CC BY-SA 4.0
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