An Interview With Rizopia – Tips on Cooking Rice Pasta

Who doesn’t love rice pasta?  Organic brown rice fettuccine is my absolute favorite.  It’s thin delicate strands makes it taste so much better than whole wheat or white fettuccine.  However every time I cook rice pasta, it sticks like glue together.  This is especially true for the fettuccine!

VeryVeryVegan.com had the opportunity to interview Ivan Shih from *Rizopia and ask him, how exactly does one cook rice pasta without it sticking?  The organic brown rice fettuccine (pictured above) was the specific pasta that Very Very Vegan staff were having problems cooking!

*Rizopia is an organic rice pasta manufacturing company from Toronto that has been dedicating themselves itself to producing rice pasta products under 100% gluten-free/nut-free premise since its first introduction in 2001.

VeryVeryVegan: So how do you cook rice pasta properly, specifically fettuccine, without having it stick so much?

Ivan: Rice pasta is a lot more delicate to cook than white or whole wheat pasta. There is a lot of starch in rice pasta.  You need to use a lot more water than regular pasta to cook it to dilute the starch.  Here are my three other tips for cooking rice pasta so that it doesn’t stick.

First you want to make sure that the water is at a rolling boil before you put the pasta in.  This will stop the pasta from sticking together.

Secondly, separate the pasta throughout the pot and stir it frequently making sure it’s separated.

Lastly, after you cook the pasta rinse it with water.

VeryVeryVegan: Do you recommend people rinse it off the dry pasta beforehand to get off starch?  Much like if you were cooking rice.

Ivan: No. The most important thing is to make sure you have enough water, bring the water to a rolling boil and stir it.

VeryVeryVegan: Do you recommend salting the water to separate the water.

Ivan: No it won’t make a difference.  People only add salt for taste.

VeryVeryVegan: What about olive oil?

Ivan: Some people add olive oil to separate the pasta more, but I think it’s more for taste.  Most of the time, the reason why your rice pasta sticks is because there is not enough water.

VeryVeryVegan: Thank you for your time!

So in summary, get a large pot and fill it with more water than you normally would to cook rice pasta, stir it frequently and rinse it when the pasta is done cooking.  The water will become extremely cloudy when you are cooking rice pasta because of all the starch that’s coming out.  So make sure you rinse well!  Good luck.