What stood out in your mind as the difference or differences?

I've told you before, you've never had a decent paella

The biggest difference for me was the consistency. With several cheaper rice cookers I've used, the rice could come out a little dry or a little soggy with no apparent cause. The Zojirushi cookers come out perfectly every time.

There are also a couple minor convenience points. Not having to soak the rice in advance(and risk forgetting about it) is helpful--the fancier cookers don't start cooking immediately, but soak the rice for you first. The timer can also be convenient--if you want rice at a certain time but won't be at home an hour in advance to get it started, you can just set the timer and go.

Completely agree. My Zoji's have fuzzylogic which seems to do this perfectly.

In addition, because you can hold rice for several hours (in my view basmati seems to improve and dry and seperate more when holding for an hour or two particularly if you butter the base ...... ) it means you're cooking your fish or meat to perfection rather than trying to time it to when the rice has cooked.

Any advise on cooking Brown Rice on a cheap rice cooker that takes 2 cups of uncooked white rice.
Its just plain USA brown rice bought at grocery store ,

I love brown rice but gave up on it because it never comes out good with the rice cooker

thanks for your help

Soarer

Make sure you're buying US Brown labeled "long grain".
Rinse it before hand.
If at first you don't succeed, add a little oil or butter before cooking.
In a "dirt cheap" rice cooker, I get the best results from Basmati/"Texmati" brown rice, no rinsing necessary.

Generally speaking, you need a bit more water when cooking brown rice.

But what do you mean "never comes out good?" Undercooked, not softened enough or what? What would mean "good" for your taste?

Growing up in a rice-based culture from Asia, I often find the "western counterparts" have different ideas about a good-cooked rice. For instance, for plain rice, I've never seen anyone in my country adding either oil nor butter during cooking. That will ruin the nature sweetness, fragrance and texture of the good rice, especially for the high-quality types.

Even within Asia, different cultures have different standards for "the right ways" to cook rice. For instance, my Iranian friend once told me if anyone made rice the way my country people did, that would be qualified as a bad cook. He said Iranians likes their rice stay "individualized" and separate from each other when done, while we like it more toward the sticky end, to each his own.

not softened enough ,or undercooked , I guess they would be the same ?

I add extra water , but have not soaked the brown rice before cooking ,

White rice I like "wet" , I add some extra water so it stays in chunks when I scoop it out of the rice cooker.

Soarer

Brown rice is chewy; its texture will be nothing like white. If you try it at a restaurant, that'd be a comparison point for you to go by.
How much extra water do you add? While white is a 1:1 ratio, brown is closer to a 2:1 ratio. If you still have the manual for your cooker, it might have measurement instructions for brown. Otherwise, one scoop from the plastic cup with two cups (16oz) of water. From that, adjust to your preferences.
Soaking brown rice will increase the chance of your rice achieving the best texture; 60 minutes is best, but 30 occasionally works in a pinch. Unless the packaging says otherwise, don't dump the soaking water. You lose a lot of the good stuff that makes brown nutritious.

My family couldn't afford the fancy rice cooker when we were younger, so we had to use the microwave to re-heat our rice. Keeping it in the cheapo cooker on warm would've just ruined the rice.
When I got my own place, I got the cheapo $20 cooker. You do have to watch out for the pan developing a hole. Whether it's cheap or expensive, get the biggest capacity--even for one person. You can use rice cookers as slow cookers, so it's easy to make cheap soups and other meals that are great for your budget. My room mate has a sanyo and it's great--not only for rice and quinoa, but it makes lots of great soups.
Go to your asian grocery store to look at rice cookers. There is a pretty good range of prices.

I've had a relatively cheap rice cooker for many years, and I hate the thing. I think I finally threw it out. It never made anything approximately close to decent rice, it burped white goopy water all over, and it frequently burned the rice on the bottom. The rice would turn out consistently bad, but in very different ways. I always measure with rice, and this cooker would produce wet sloppy rice one day, and dry crunchy rice the next!

It seems like everyone here is thrilled with their rice cookers. I'm amazed by that given how horrible my experience has been.

Got another rice cooker at a yard sale for a $1 , it has a flip lid and does not "leak" or over flow which is nice ,

white rice is about the same as the other cheap one , its just not as much of a mess,

I use the old cheap rice cooker now to cook pasta which turned out pretty good !

Soarer

Based on this thread, we ponied up for this model:

http://www.amazon.com/Zojirushi-NS-Y.../dp/B004S9RR50

The cook in the family is skeptical any rice cooker is worth $200...we'll see.

I'll bump an old thread. Finally bought a rice cooker today - a Zojirushi NS-WXC10. It wasn't the one I'd initially wanted (had been going for one of the ones with a steamer basket) but this was the only one in stock at Bed Bath & Beyond when we went there with our 20% off coupon. We'll try it out tonight!

Let me know if you end up with any liquid under the cooker after it is finished. Mine almost always leaves a small amount of whitish water.

Oh, they can go much higher than that:



The picture above was taken at an e-Mart in Seoul, South Korea (roughly a Wally-World equivalent). The one on the right is about U$D 700.00, give or take.




Same store. Both units go for about U$D 525.00, give or take.