This Rice Cooker Saves Me So Much Time When Making Dinner for My Family

Capacity: 5.5 cups uncooked, 11 cups cooked | Dimensions: 10-1/8 x 14 x 8-1/2 inches | Includes: steaming basket, rice measuring cup, nonstick rice spatula and spatula holder | Settings: white/sushi, mixed, porridge, sweet, brown, cake, steam and quick cooking

Zojirushi Micom Rice Cooker Features I Love

• For starters, it comes with a removable easy-to-clean steam vent cap that keeps steam from splattering all over my kitchen. Now I don't need to worry about scalding my arm or pulling the mop out every time I cook.
• The rice doesn't stick to the pan! This makes it really easy to serve the rice, and cleanup is a cinch. I'm very protective of my rice cooker, so I don't mind that Zojirushi recommends hand-washing the parts, but also it's so easy to clean.
• No rice-to-water ratios to memorize. The Zojirushi Rice Cooker comes with a scoop for measuring rice. Add the number of scoops you want to the bowl and then fill with water to the number on the side of the bowl that corresponds with the number of scoops you used. Seriously, you can't mess it up!
• It makes the perfect rice. This should go without saying, but this rice cooker makes perfectly cooked, fluffy rice every time. It has a sensor to know the rice is done and will adjust the time and temperature automatically. When it's done, it switches to Warm automatically until you're ready to eat.
• Among design features I didn't know I needed, but now can't live without: a musical timer and a retractable power cord. A timer that plays you a melody when it's ready? Yes, you can choose the beep setting if that's not your thing, but I like my rice cooker to sing to me when it's done cooking. It's such a pleasant sensory moment when the rest of the house is mayhem. And every kitchen appliance should have a power cord that retracts neatly into the appliance—it makes for tidy, more organized stowing. After a couple of years of weekly use, the power cord is a little harder to retract back into the cooker, but at the rate I use it, it's still solid.
• Other features worth noting: This rice cooker also comes with a rice paddle and steaming basket, and it has several functions for white/sushi, mixed, porridge, sweet, brown, quick-cooking, steam and even cake. I have not tried making a cake in my rice cooker ... yet.

Some Cons to Consider

• At around $200 retail, it's kind of pricy. You could try shopping around for a deal or wait till it goes on sale. But if you make rice as much as I do, it's worth it.
• A small detail, but a little annoying: the measuring cup that comes with the rice cooker doesn't fit in the machine with the steam basket inside, so you need to store it separately.
  

Rice Cooker vs. Instant Pot

When I began my search, my biggest question was "Should I get a rice cooker or an Instant Pot?" I needed an expert opinion, so I consulted Breana Lai Killeen, M.P.H., RD, EatingWell's Test Kitchen & editorial operations manager, who pointed me in the direction of a rice cooker.

"A Zojirushi has been in every kitchen of my life," she told me. "The Instant Pot does cook rice pretty well, so would be a good choice if you're an occasional rice eater. That said, if you don't think you'll want to pressure-cook, or if you don't want a large-ish appliance and you eat rice all the time, stick with a rice cooker." I already have a slow cooker and didn't think I would use any of the other Instant Pot features, so for me the choice was easy.

Other Rice Cookers We Recommend

Zojirushi Micom 10-Cup Rice Cooker and Warmer ($200 at Amazon): This model has all the features of my 5 ½-cup cooker but with a 20-cup cooked rice capacity. It is bulkier, yes, and will need dedicated counter space.

Hamilton Beach 8-Cup Rice Cooker and Food Steamer ($40 at Amazon): This slightly more compact rice cooker is easy to operate and costs a fraction of Zojirushi models. Steel-cut oats also turned out well in this cooker.

Cuckoo 10-Cup Pressure Rice Cooker ($280 at Amazon): This splurge option is sleek-looking and boasts a large capacity. Its niche features might be more than what the average home cook needs, but its voice prompts eliminate user error.

What Can You Make With a Rice Cooker?

Rice goes with so many of my favorite meals and cuisines: curries, stir-fries, sushi, simmered with broth and veggies for chicken soup, or mixed with spices and beans for arroz con gandules, a Puerto Rican dish I grew up eating. For a quick lunch, we top leftover white rice with kimchi (or in my son's case, ketchup). More often than not, we'll have rice as a side for fried tofu, roast chicken or grilled fish for an easy weeknight dinner.

One day after skateboard camp, my then-7-year-old came up to me and asked me to make rice for lunch, since we had no leftovers in the fridge. Rice. For Lunch. On a workday! Who does that? Me, that's who. Instead of getting all worked up and stressed out and saying no, I replied, "Sure! Let me just push a button and lunch will be ready when it sings to you." This machine has turned me into a yes person. How cool is that?

Are Rice Cookers Worth It?

Rice cookers allow you set it and forget while you tend to other things—whether it's making the rest of your meal, folding laundry or just relaxing on the couch for a "me minute" with a glass of wine. Rice cookers usually have a sensor to know when the rice is done and will switch off or to a keep-warm function until you're ready to eat, so you don't have to worry about pots overflowing on the stove or food burning in the pan.

When I know rice is on the menu, the first thing I'll do when I start cooking dinner is get the rice going. That way I know it will be ready whenever dinner is done. Getting the rice in the cooker takes less than five minutes, and most of that is for rinsing the rice. Really, if you can scoop rice and pour water, you can make rice in a rice cooker.

Not all rice cookers are created equal, however! My first rice cooker was a very basic model that I inherited in my kitchen when my husband and I moved in together. I used it for over 10 years at least a couple of times a week, even though it had two major drawbacks that really bugged me. While it was cooking, the steam vent hole would spit out a sticky mess of rice splatters all over the floor. Also, no matter what adjustments I made, the rice always stuck to the pan—making it really difficult to get the rice out (not to mention, it was a real pain to wash).

Our Trusted Expertise

As senior editorial director, Penelope Wall oversees the digital editorial vision of EatingWell—drawing on both her passion for food, wellness and storytelling and over 20 years of experience in digital content strategy and editorial. She's been using the Zojirushi Micom Rice Cooker with 5 1/2-cup capacity since 2021 and she still raves about it and uses it multiple times a week. Some additional insights about this rice cooker came from staff and food writers in our Test Kitchen who have tested 19 different rice cookers across multiple tests. An updated version of this article was edited by Brierley Horton, M.S., RD, a senior commerce editor with over 15 years of experience writing about nutrition, health and food.