Want delicious brown rice (or brown rice blends) cooked perfectly every time, WITHOUT the hassle? You’ll love this step-by-step, hands-off, no-fail Instant Pot Brown Rice Recipe! It’s fluffy and deliciously flavored with olive oil and all the garlic. It’s perfect for busy weeks and easy meal prep. Make a batch and serve it all week as a side dish, a healthy stir fry or even add to salads. – recipe makes 5 cups of cooked rice.
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Why I love this Instant Pot Brown Rice Recipe
Oi Gente!
We Brazilians love our rice. And while my favorite type will always be white rice, I do like to add variety to my diet with other stuff, like quinoa, couscous, wheat berries, all sorts of other rices, and of course, brown rice.
But cooking brown rice on the stove can be such a pain. It takes forever, you have to baby it and it’s a hassle… even for an experienced rice cook like myself.
That’s why I love this Instant Pot brown rice recipe! There’s none of the hassle, and the rice comes out perfect every. single. time!
The best part is that it’s a hands-off recipe with no pot watching needed. The rice turns out fluffy, chewy, and tastes amazing.
I love that this recipe also works for beautiful brown rice blends, so I can keep things interesting.
And I can make a batch that I can eat all week, all sorts of different ways.
This Instant Pot Brown Rice is great in salads, as a side dish, as an add-on to savory breakfast bowls, or as a healthier fried rice dinner. The possibilities are endless!
I hope you love this quick and easy way of cooking brown rice as much as I do!
Bom Apetite!
Tools and ingredients
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- Fine mesh strainer
- Measuring cups
- Instant Pot (or another electric pressure cooker)
You’ll also need:
- Long Grain Brown rice — or your favorite brown rice blend. I love this one and this one!
- Olive oil — or another neutral oil
- Garlic cloves or Brazilian Sofrito — to add extra flavor to the rice. This is a must to giving the rice excellent flavor.
- Kosher salt — Diamond Crystal is my go-to brand, and it is a medium-grain kosher salt.
How to make brown rice taste good
Obviously, if we want tasty rice, we have to make it Brazilian style!
I share this same tip over here on this white rice post, but the basic preparation for almost all rice types in Brazil is pretty similar.
Our not-so-secret secret is to sauté a couple of cloves of minced garlic and sometimes even some diced onions, too! This little step adds so much flavor to any rice, and it makes all the difference.
Another thing we can’t leave out is the salt! Adding the proper amount of salt to your rice is a simple way to make it go from boring to delicious.
And my last little trick to get brown rice to taste good is a nice drizzle of olive oil on top! It’s so good!
Is brown rice healthy?
Yes! Brown rice is very healthy. It’s whole grain, so it contains an impressive amount of vitamins and minerals that our bodies need, which are usually “shaved off” of white rice.
Including brown rice as part of an overall healthy diet is also supposed to help prevent and improve a number of health conditions, like diabetes and heart disease.
Brown rice to water ratio
For the instant pot, the brown rice to water ratio is 2 cups of long grain brown rice (or brown rice blends) to 2 1/4 cups of liquid.
For the liquid, you can use water or stock to make it even more flavorful!
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How to make brown rice soft
Use the instant pot or any other type of pressure cooker, meus amigos!
That’s the best advice I can give anyone who wants to learn how to cook brown rice. It’s no hassle and perfectly cooks our brown rice every time. It’s life changing!
How to cook brown rice in Instant Pot
Before we begin, rinse the brown rice. I put mine in a fine mesh strainer and run water over it until the water is clear.
Let it sit for about 10 minutes while you build the flavor in the Instant Pot. The longer the rice sits and dries, the fluffier, less sticky it’ll get after the cook.
Sometimes, I wash as I’m making breakfast and let it sit there until I’m ready to cook it for lunch or even dinner. Sometimes, I just wait the 10 minutes and it’s all good.
Step 1. Add olive oil and the minced garlic, or your bff Brazilian sofrito, to the instant pot on sauté mode.
Step 2. Sauté until fragrant and then take a moment to smell the magic in the air. Isn’t it so great?
Step 3. Then, add the rice and the salt, then give them a nice stir.
Step 4. Add in the liquid. Remembering that it can be water or broth for a richer flavor!
Step 5. Set it to pressure cook (manual) at high pressure for 20 minutes.
When it beeps to let you know that the cook time has finished, let the pressure release naturally for 10 minutes.
If the pressure has not completely dissipated after this point, manually quick release the rest of the pressure.
Step 6. Uncover your Instant Pot and let the rice breathe for a few minutes.
Then fluff it up and serve!!
What to eat with Instapot brown rice
There are so many ingredients and dishes you can serve with this easy brown rice recipe.
Here are a few of my favorites:
- Instant Pot Pinto Beans
- Chimichurri Salmon
- Brazilian Style Collard Greens
- Brazilian Ground Beef Picadillo Recipe
Quick tips and tricks to the best electric pressure cooker brown rice
- Don’t forget the flavor adding ingredients. This means the garlic (or Brazilian sofrito) and onion.
- Swap out the brown rice for a brown rice blend. It’ll cook for the same amount of time and add some variety if you eat this a lot!
- How to store: Let the rice cool down, and transfer to an airtight storage container. Refrigerate for 4-5 days.
More Rice Recipes to try:
More Instant Pot Recipes You’ll Love
- Canja de Galinha – Brazilian Chicken and Rice Soup
- Instant Pot Pumpkin Risotto Recipe
- How to Cook Wheat Berries
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Instant Pot Brown Rice Recipe
Ingredients
- 2 cups of uncooked, long grain brown rice rinsed, then well drained (about 10-15 minutes)
- 1 Tbsp of Brazilian sofrito or 3 cloves of garlic, minced
- 1 Tbsp of olive oil
- 2 tsp kosher salt
- 2 1/4 cups Cooking liquid water, sometimes I use stock
Instructions
- In a fine mesh strainer, rinse the rice with cool water until the water runs clear. Shake the strainer a few times to remove excess water and let it sit for 10 minutes.
- With your instant pot on saute mode, heat up the olive oil, then add in the Brazilian sofrito.
- Saute a minute or two, until fragrant, then add in the rinsed rice to the pot.
- Add in the salt, and stir to combine.
- Add in the 2 1/4 cups of water, turn the pot off. Close the Instant Pot lid and turn the steam valve to the sealing position.
- Set the Instant Pot to pressure cook (manual) at high pressure for 20 minutes.
- When it beeps to let you know that the cook time has finished, let the pressure release naturally for 10 minutes.
- After the 10 minute natural release, carefully turn the steam valve to the venting position and release the remaining pressure manually. When you can, carefully open the Instant Pot lid.
- Fluff with a fork, and serve!
Great recipe the garlic gave a lovely flavour to otherwise plain rice.
Yes, the garlic makes all the different!! It’s so great!
Nice. I love making rice in my Instant Pot. It cooks up so fast, and it’s always perfect.
Brown rice is so much more nutritional than white. What a great way to make fluffy rice using the Instant Pot. I will do a stovetop version of this recipe. I know it will be just as delicious. Great to use in so many different recipes.
I LOVE making rice in the Instant Pot. Basically what I make most in the Instant Pot. But I have never made it with brown rice. So I am definitely going to give this a go… IF I can find some rice these days!!!
Awwww I know!! It’s been rough times lately!! I hope you can find it soon!!! xx
I love cooking rice in Instant Pot! It’s such a simple and easy way to make perfect rice every single time!
Such an easy but delicious recipe to make, I will definitely make this as all ingredients are available in my kitchen. Thank you!
This rice was super simple to make! I don’t think I will make rice any other way again!
Instant Pots are SO darn useful I love mine and use it for all sorts of things. This rice was great.
This Instant Pot Brown Rice Recipe is really yummy! I love the olive oil and garlic for this. Thank you.
I like your tip of adding sauteed garlic and onion to rice to give it some flavor taking a simple side dish to the next level.
Brown rice in the instant pot? Genius! I hate how long it takes to cook rice in a pot – this recipe is great!
Great recipe and so easy too! Love the garlic and that you used stock for extra flavor! Perfect!
This is truly the best brown rice recipe ever. So much easier than the stovetop and so tasty. We loved the addition of garlic and will make this again soon.
Thank you, Ellie!!! So happy you love the recipe 🙂
I thought about making this recipe for a while and finally gave it a go. I’m not super crazy about brown rice but this recipe definitely made me start loving it! Really delicious!