Historical Background for Rice Cookers
Rice has been a staple of many eastern diets for
millennia. It was cheap to grow, filling, and provided people with many
nutrients even on a low income. While the modern electric rice cooker has
only been around since the 20th century, cooking rice has long
been a part of various cultures for generations, and has gone through a
variety of changes since rice first became part of the average diet.
Early Rice Cookers
Rice itself has likely been a part of Asian diets
for possibly 10,000 years or longer. Methods of cooking rice varied through
generations, but the first known rice cooker was said to have been created
in the 8th century, using a platform cooker made of nothing but
clay, soil, and wood. This type of rice cooker was not only designed to cook
rice more evenly, but it was also portable and contained, much in the same
way as modern rice cookers. It was then that the current pan shape of the
rice cooker was found to be the most efficient way of cooking rice.
For centuries, rice cookers remained un-evolved.
But by the 1920’s, several companies began searching for ways to use
electricity to help cook rice evenly and within a household.
The First Electric Rice Cookers
By the 1940’s, a company known as Mitsubishi
Electric was able to develop an effective electric rice cooker that would
then pave the way for the current version of the rice cooker. Though not
successful, that technological advancement led the way for the Toshiba rice
cooker – a crude but effective electric model that ballooned to as many as
200,000 sales a month in and around
Toshiba was able to utilize timers with their
technology, increasing the usefulness of the rice cooker and making it
quickly become a useful feature in Japanese homes. This rice cooker also
utilized a similar temperature gauge feature that is still used today.
Though slightly different (Toshiba used an outer bowl evaporation method),
their rice cookers still had a thermostat-off system that effectively
ensured the machine would turn off when completed.
By 1960, rice cookers had already evolved with
their own “Keep Warm” feature – a feature that was able to keep rice warm
until it was ready to be eaten.
Fuzzy Logic and Induction Heating
Though still expensive and not standard on most
current models, Fuzzy Logic and IH rice cookers were actually introduced
several decades ago. Computerized rice cookers (which resembled Fuzzy Logic)
were introduced in the last 1970’s, while induction heating was introduced
in 1988 by the Matsushita Electric Industrial Co. IH rice cookers use a lot
of electricity, but have reduced the need to wash rice beforehand, making
them quite the luxury for those that have the money to spare.
Rice cooking technology continues to develop even
today. Though to the average tongue the difference in flavor may not be as
noticeable, for those that love rice and have survived on it for years, the
better the technology, the better the rice – and better rice means a
delicious meal that pleases the palate every day.
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