Basmati Rice

Basmati Rice is a variety of long grain rice, famous for its fragrance and delicate flavor. Its name means ‘’Queen of fragrance’’. Basmati Rice is nature’s exclusive gift to the Indian sub-continent for hundreds of years. No other rice in the world has this combined characteristic of exquisite aroma, sweet taste and post cooking elongation.

By virtue of its geographical position, water and soil quality plus special weather conditions, this rice is different from other rice varieties. It is grown in Northern India. The Himalayan foot hills are said to produce the best basmati rice. Although ll basmati varieties are fragrant rice of highest quality, commercially, THE SUPER BASMATI, a premium variety from Dehra Dun are the most priced of the basmati varieties.

The gains of basmati are much longer than they are wide and they grew even larger as they cook. They stay firm and separate, not sticky after cooking. Basmati rice due to the high amount of starch clinging to the rice grains, many cook wash this rice before cooking it. Soaking it for half an hour to two hours before cooking makes the grins less likely to break during cooking. A number of varieties of basmati rice exist. Traditional one includes Basmati -370, Basmati- 385, and Basmati Ranabipura while hybrid basmati varieties include pure basmati (also called ‘Todal’ because the flower has awns). Fragrant rice’s that are derived from basmati stock but are not considered true basmati varieties include PB2 (also called sugandh-2), PB3 and RH-10.

Indian Basmati rice has a very different aroma and taste from Chinese and Thai Jasmine rice. These are many’ ’knock off’ ’varieties grown in the US and other countries, but none match authentic Indian basmati for flavor, aroma texture, and appearance. Basmati contain the natural, 2 actyl-1 praline content of PPM 0.06, which brings its unique, unmatched by any other rice in the world. Traditional basmati plants are tall and slender and are prone to lodging in high winds. They have a relatively low yield, but produce high quality grains and command high prices in both Indian and International markets.