Almost all grains are grasses. Beyond that, though, each grain is distinct in terms of flavor, texture, color, and cooking times. Still, most are interchangeable. To help you experiment and make the best use of whatever you have on hand, I’ve included the line “Other grains you can use” in recipes that work with other options.
By now we’ve all heard of quinoa, and many of us have tried grains that once seemed exotic. If you haven’t given grains like teff or amaranth a try yet, I encourage you to. They taste great, go with nearly any vegetable topping, and are an easy way to add variety to your diet. You’ll find all of these in any decent supermarket or health food store, but if you don’t, they’re just a few keystrokes away.
If you know nothing about cooking grains, just start with the essential recipe, Cooking Grains, the Easy Way (page 398).
In any case, cooking grains is straightforward: You boil them in water or other liquid. They may be toasted (cooked in a dry skillet) or sautéed (cooked in a skillet with oil or other fat) before further cooking, but for the most part there’s not much more to it than this. Don’t worry about starting with an exact amount of water; you can always add more, or drain or cook off the excess. (Few experienced cooks actually measure water for grains, because they know it’s a little different every time anyway.)
Microwave ovens, pressure cookers, rice cookers, and slow cookers are all fine tools, but the basic recipe is really your best choice. A couple of exceptions worth noting: The microwave works well for quinoa; follow the microwave directions in the variation for White Rice on page 367. The pressure cooker is a bit faster than the stovetop but requires checking for doneness, which is sometimes a hassle. The slow cooker works for long-cooking grains, but you cannot “set it and forget it”; you must check frequently to capture the moment before the grain kernels burst. The rice cooker works well for white rice because white rice is a more consistent product than whole grains. But other grains are too tricky.