Aroma ARC-914SBD 8-Cup (Cooked) Digital Rice Cooker and Food Steamer

I bought this rice cooker after reading reviews and ratings about it. Rice is a staple for me and have been wanting to buy an a reasonably priced but good rice cooker. My current one was okay. Cooked my rice just he way I wanted it but since I was going to buy a new and bigger onenfor my fam, I did my research online.
I give it a 3. It doesnt cook my rice any better than my old rice cooker so far. I thought maybe as I use it more often, the product would get better but so far I am still using my old one because I like the way my white rice cooks with it. Aesthetically, this products looks great on my counter but functionally, I can only give it a 3. I havent tried brown rice on it yet so this rating is still partial.

Following the instructions of the booklet doesn’t work for cooking 1 cup of brown Rice. Hope this info helps you.

–Test 1–(with the booklet Instructions)
Put 1 Cup Brown Rice in the pot first, then added Water up to the “1 cup line” in the pot.
Time Delay: 15 hours
Result: The rice was rarely edible and SUPER dry and crumbly. If you put the rice in the pot first and then water(up to 1 cup line), it doesn’t have enough water at all.

–Test 2–(See my photos)
Put Water up to the “1 cup line” in the pot first without adding rice, and then add exact 1 cup of Rice (well drained).
Time Delay: 5 hours
Result: The rice was OK but it’s still hard and dry.

–Test 3–(1 cup Rice + about 550ml water)
Time Delay: 9 hours
Result: Success! Very nice and sticky!

Ordered this product around Christmas time and have been using it for 6 months. At first it worked great and cooked rice perfectly. However now it has broken. When i select the white rice cook setting it finishes after 10 minutes and the rice will still be hard, sitting in water. When i try to steam something for any amount of time it will steam for one minute then immediately go to the keep warm setting like it has finished. So maybe i got a defective rice cooker? Maybe its cheap and broke fast? But it covered under a two year warranty so i should have it for two years right?

I contacted the company about the warranty and it will cost me more to get it fixed than to just buy a new one. I would have to pay to mail it to them which will cost around $20 to the USA from Canada. Then they also want $14 USD enclosed to mail it back. Avoid this product!

Okay. I’ll give it five stars based on the rice it produces and easy of use and design. It does indeed make pretty much perfect rice, white, brown, wild, etc. as well as other grains. It comes with a little measuring cup. The water level marks inside (none too easy to see, are calibrated for the number of these little cups of grain you use. But the cup is about 3/4 cup, Why? Because that’s 1-gou, the standard Japanese rice serving measure. But that’s no big deal. Nor is it a problem that the water marks inside are hard to read. Just use one measure of water to one measure of rice. I know. That’s different from your usual ratio for stovetop rice.

There’s a little bit of learning to do at first. I use more water with brown rice, more like 1.5 water to one brown rice. And some rice is drier than other rices, and need more water. I find that you can have a little more water, but you don’t want to have too little, because the rice will be less than fully prepared. For instance, I forgot about the little measuring cup and absentmindedly used a full one cup measure but added water to the line for two gou. I got slightly underdone rice.

Remember that the cooker knows when the water has been absorbed. Rice cookers work because, so long as there is free water in the pot, the temperature cannot rise above 212F (at sea level). So all the pot need do is stop cooking and reduce temperature to warm when the pot temperature rises about 212F. That’s why it works for all grains. And that means the cooker doesn’t really know when the rice is done, only when the water is gone.

Now, you will see all sorts of different ratios recommended by rice cooker recipes and for different cookers. Lots of people use 1.5:1 for white rice. Quinoa is happier with a 2:1 ratio. Anything reasonably close will work, so long as you use enough water for the grain to be fully cooked when the water is gone. If you use a little more water than you needed, it will go on cooking until absorbed. The worst that will happen is that it might get a little softer than you’d like. And you can even fix it when you open the pot and find it isn’t quite done. Just add a bit more water and start the cycle again. The cooker will still know when that water is absorbed. That’s the lovely thing about a rice cooker. It can sort of peak under the lid for you, plus it doesn’t have to be watched.

Es un producto que no sabes que necesitas hasta que lo tienes. Personalmente me ahorra mucho tiempo ya que no soy tan fan de comer en la calle y prefiero cocinar mis propios alimentos y consumirlos durante el día. Es muy fácil de usar si se leen bien las instrucciones. Hago énfasis en lavar bien el arroz crudo hasta que el agua salga transparente (retirar el almidón). Normalmente el arroz no se lava porque se fríe. Aquí si es necesario ya que el arroz solo hirve. La arrocera incluye una taza para medir. Según el manual el número de porciones que salen es el doble de tazas de arroz crudo pero yo como bastante y considero que no es así, por ejemplo de 3 tazas me salen 4 porciones. Otro detalle que me parece a resaltar es la charola para cocinar al vapor, ya que cocina muy bien las verduras. Aún no cocino carne, espero que no salga cruda.

Hasta ahora muy buen producto, ojalá tenga una larga vida útil. Le doy 4 estrellas por el precio, lo considero elevado para la capacidad de la arrocera.

Soy de los que quema el agua pero con esta cosa pude hacer mi primer arroz para sushi, es súper fácil de usar