How to Cook the Perfect Rice: A Guide Backed by Japanese Research
Last updated: 30 August 2026
Cooking rice looks straightforward, and in Japan it is treated as anything but. The steps below draw on published Japanese food science, including work by Yasuko Kainuma at the University of Shizuoka's School of Food and Nutritional Sciences, alongside what we have learned cooking rice ourselves.
You do not have to follow every step. Knowing why each one exists is what lets you decide which ones matter in your kitchen.
Our specialist, Kai, wrote this guide to cooking Japanese rice. In this guide:
- The rice and the water — variety, and why filtered water helps.
- Washing — temperature matters more than the number of rinses.
- Three extras — kombu, water quality and donabe okoge.
- Soaking — when it is essential and when your cooker does it for you.
- Water-to-rice ratio — and cooking on the stovetop.
- Resting — the step most people skip.
1. The Right Rice Matters
Use good short-grain or medium-grain Japanese rice. These absorb water evenly and hold their structure, which is what gives the finished grain its texture. Koshihikari is the benchmark for a reason: slight sweetness, a chewy bite and a glossy surface1.
Filtered water is worth using. Rice takes up both odour and taste readily, so minerals in hard water carry through to the bowl — something to consider if you are in Adelaide or Perth. Melbourne tap water, for what it is worth, produces excellent rice, partly because it runs cold. Temperature comes up again below.
2. Proper Washing Technique
Washing rice matters, but not in the way most people think. It is not the number of rinses — it is the temperature. Do not use warm or hot water. Use cold.
Around 15°C is the usual recommendation. Some go further, rinsing at 5–10°C and resting the soaked rice in the fridge for half an hour before cooking. Cold tap water is generally enough.
One of our team learned this the hard way in a Japanese restaurant kitchen: the weather was cold, so he washed the rice in warm water. The starch dissolved into the water and rinsed away with it, and the finished rice was flat in both taste and texture.
Cold water leaves a thin layer of starch on the grain, which is what balances stickiness against separation. You can see it in the rinse water — warm water runs cloudy and starchy, cold water runs comparatively clear.
Three Things Worth Trying
- Filtered water: water quality carries straight through to flavour. Filtered or soft water gives a cleaner result.
- Kombu: a small piece of kelp added before cooking lifts the umami without making the rice taste of anything in particular.
- A donabe: cooking rice in a donabe gives a texture an electric cooker cannot copy. The thick clay spreads heat evenly and forms a crisp layer on the base, called okoge.
3. The Importance of Soaking
Soak for at least 30 minutes in room-temperature water, roughly 20–25°C, or in the fridge as above. This is what gives you even cooking right through the grain.
If you use a micom or IH rice cooker, skip it. Soaking is already built into the cycle — on the Tiger JPW-G10A, for instance, the standard Plain menu runs 47 to 57 minutes at any capacity, and the soak is part of that time. Pre-soaking adds nothing.
Soaking matters most on the stovetop and in clay pots. Soak the rice, then move it straight into the cooking pot and add your cooking water.
Do not drain the rice. If you tip it into a colander and let it dry out after soaking, the grains crack. Move it from the soaking bowl into the pot — or into the rice cooker's inner pot — add water, and start cooking.
4. The Ideal Water-to-Rice Ratio
Use 1.2 to 1.3 parts water to one part rice, adjusting for the variety and how soft you like it. More water, softer rice.
Rice cookers, particularly Tiger and Zojirushi models, are calibrated to their own inner-pot markings, so follow those rather than measuring separately. Induction models hold temperature more precisely, which shows up in how evenly the rice cooks.
On the stovetop, use a heavy-based pot with a tight lid. Bring it to the boil, drop to a gentle simmer, and leave it covered for 12 to 15 minutes. Then rest it off the heat for another 10 minutes before opening. For clay pots, our donabe user guide covers the method in full.
5. Let It Steam
The last step is the one most often skipped. Leave the cooked rice to sit with the lid on for 10 to 15 minutes. The moisture redistributes through the grains in that time, and the difference in fluffiness is obvious.
Then fluff it with a rice paddle, using a slicing motion rather than stirring, so the grains stay whole.
Essential steps recap
- Choose quality rice — Japanese short-grain such as Koshihikari.
- Rinse in cold water — around 15°C, never warm.
- Soak for 30 minutes — room temperature or in the fridge.
- Do not drain — move the rice straight into the cooking pot.
- Add water — 1.2 to 1.3 parts per part of rice.
- Follow your pot — your rice cooker's markings, or our donabe user guide.
- Rest after cooking — lid on, 10 to 15 minutes.
See all Japanese donabe and all Japanese rice cookers.
1 Koshihikari is a short-grain japonica variety, prized for its sweet, faintly nutty flavour and slightly sticky texture when cooked — the reason it is the default choice for sushi and for everyday Japanese meals.
About the Author
Kai, the author of this guide, is our product specialist at My Cookware®. For any follow-up questions, email hello@mycookware.com.au or use the chat box on this page.
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