JP2003339533A - Rice cooker - Google Patents

Abstract

<P>PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To provide a rice cooker capable of cooking whole rice while increasing the nutrition value. <P>SOLUTION: The cooking process using this rice cooker for boiling rice according to a preset rice comprises an activating process for heating whole rice for a prescribed time within the range of 30 min to 5 hr at a prescribed temperature within the range of 40±10°C before a water absorbing process in the rice cooking process to activate it. <P>COPYRIGHT: (C)2004,JPO

Description

Detailed Description of the Invention

[0001]

TECHNICAL FIELD The present invention relates to a rice cooker. In particular, it relates to a rice cooker for cooking germinated rice such as brown rice.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art In recent years, brown rice having embryos before pearling is activated by immersing it in water at about 40 ° C., and as shown in FIG. 4, it contains a large amount of γ-amino acid (GABA). Is known to be. This γ-amino acid has an effect of improving cerebral blood flow and hypertension, and an effect of improving renal function and liver function. Further, various effects such as reduction of neutral fat are known. Therefore, it has become popular to cook and eat brown rice, which excels in health promotion as well as health promotion. In the case of cooking brown rice, in the conventional rice cooker, the water absorption process (preheating process) is performed at a temperature of about 60 ° C., which is higher than in the case of cooking white rice, and for 15 to 20 minutes.
And cooking rice.

[0003]

However, the water absorption process of the conventional rice cooker is provided such that brown rice absorbs water sufficiently and the texture when cooked is improved.
Therefore, in this conventional water absorption step, an increase in the nutritional value of brown rice, that is, the amount of GABA can hardly be expected.

[0004] Therefore, it is an object of the present invention to provide a rice cooker capable of increasing the nutritional value of embryo rice and cooking rice.

[0005]

[Means for Solving the Problems] In a rice cooker that cooks rice by a preset rice cooking process, before the water absorption process of the rice cooking process, the germinated rice is kept at 40 ° C ± 40 ° C for a predetermined time within a range of 30 minutes to 5 hours. It is provided with an activation step of activating by heating at a predetermined temperature within the range of 10 ° C.

In the above invention, the germinated rice is activated in the activation step and then cooked, so that the germinated rice having a high nutritional value can be eaten.

The embryo rice preferably contains brown rice and fractionated rice. This makes it possible to eat rice having a high nutritional value by activating the brown rice and the separated rice before cooking.

The predetermined time is preferably within a range of 2 hours ± 1 hour, and the predetermined temperature is preferably 40 ° C.
It is preferably within a range of ± 5 ° C. Thereby, the germinated rice can be reliably activated.

[0009]

BEST MODE FOR CARRYING OUT THE INVENTION Embodiments of the present invention will be described below with reference to the accompanying drawings.

FIG. 1 shows a rice cooker 1 according to the present invention. The rice cooker 1 includes an inner pot 2 and a main body 3 that houses the inner pot 2.
And a lid 4 attached to the main body 3 in an openable and closable manner.

The inner pot 2 is made of antibacterial stainless steel coated with a fluororesin containing an antibacterial agent. Thereby, the putrefaction of the rice contained in the inner pot 2 can be prevented.

The main body 3 is formed in a bottomed cylindrical shape capable of accommodating the inner pot 2. The main body 3 is provided with heating means 5, temperature detecting means 6 and control circuit 7. The heating means 5 is composed of an induction heating coil and is adapted to electromagnetically heat the inner pot 2 by applying a high frequency current thereto. The temperature detecting means 6 is provided in pressure contact with the side surface of the inner pot 2, and detects the temperature of the inner pot 2 and outputs it to the control circuit 7. The control circuit 7
Controls the heating means 5 on the basis of the temperature detected by the temperature detection means 6 in cooperation with a timer, and activates steps described later, water absorption, medium papper, boiling maintenance, boiling, unevenness, and heat retention. Each step is sequentially executed to cook rice.

The lid 4 is attached to the main body 3 so as to be openable and closable and closes the opening of the main body 3, and has a display means 8 on the upper surface.

The display means 8 comprises an operation display panel 9 as shown in FIG. On the right side of the operation display panel 9, a rice cooking switch 10 for starting the rice cooking process,
A reservation switch 11 for timer reservation and an activation switch 12 for selecting an activation course described later are provided. Also, on the left side of the operation display panel 9,
A heat retention switch 13 for setting the heat retention and an escape switch 14 for canceling the selected setting are provided. Further, a liquid crystal panel 15 is provided in the center of the operation display panel 9, and below the liquid crystal panel 15, a time switch 16 set in units of time when setting a timer reservation time, a minute switch 17 set in units of minutes, A menu switch 18 is provided for selecting a cooked rice menu such as white rice, brown rice, and divided rice. On the liquid crystal panel 15, a segment 15a indicating that the activation switch 12 has been pressed, a segment 15b for displaying the time of cooking or the current time, and a rice cooking menu selected by the menu switch 18 are displayed. And a segment 15c.

Next, the rice cooking operation of the embryo rice, particularly brown rice, by the rice cooker 1 will be described.

First, the user puts the desired number of cups of brown rice and the amount of water required to cook the rice into the inner pot 2, sets the inner pot 2 in the main body 3, and then the inner pot. The rice cooking menu of brown rice put in 2 is selected by the menu switch 18, the activation switch 12 is pressed, and the rice cooking switch 10 is further pressed. If you want to cook rice with a timer,
Set the desired cooking time and then cook rice switch 1
Press 0.

Then, the segment 15a in the liquid crystal displays that the rice is in the activated course, and the control circuit 7 turns on the heating means 5, and in the case of timer rice, turns on the power after a predetermined time has elapsed. Then, the activation process is executed. In the activation step, the heating means 5 is duty-controlled to adjust the temperature of the inner pot 2 to a predetermined temperature (40 ° C.) as shown in FIG. 3, and this is maintained for a predetermined time (2 hours). By setting such heating temperature and heating time, brown rice can be sufficiently activated without spoiling the rice.
ABA amount increases 1.1 to 2.0 times. Further, the heating temperature is preferably in the range of 40 ° C. ± 10 ° C., and more preferably in the range of 40 ° C. ± 5 ° C. Also,
The heating time is preferably within the range of 30 minutes to 5 hours, and more preferably within the range of 2 hours ± 1 hour.

When the activation step is completed, the power of the heating means 5 is increased to adjust the temperature of the inner pot 2 to 60 ° C.
The water absorption step is carried out while being maintained for 0 to 15 minutes. This water absorption process is shorter than the water absorption process of the conventional rice cooker by about 5 minutes.

When the water absorption step is completed, the heating means 5 is turned to full power to execute the medium papper step. When the temperature detecting means 6 judges that the temperature has reached 100 ° C., the boiling maintaining step is executed. Continuing the boiling maintaining process, when the temperature detecting means 6 detects a predetermined cooking temperature and determines that the temperature has been dried up, as in the conventional case, the unevenness process is performed. In the Murashi process, cooking is performed twice.
Then, a heat retention process is performed at a predetermined temperature.

As described above, since the activation step is performed before the water absorption step of the rice cooking step, the user can easily activate the rice simply by setting the brown rice in the rice cooker and cook rice with a good taste and a lot of sweetness. You can In addition, when the activation step is performed, heating is performed at a temperature of 40 ° C. for a long time before the water absorption step of the rice cooking step, so it is possible to save power consumption in the papper step and the boiling maintaining step in the rice cooking step.

In addition, by the menu switch 18, brown rice,
When germinated rice such as separated rice is selected, the activation process may be automatically executed without pressing the activation switch 12.

The activation process may be selectable for a long time or a short time, and the activation process may be set longer than usual during timer rice cooking, for example, 24-48 hours to promote germination of germ rice. Is also good.

[0023]

As is apparent from the above description, according to the present invention, before the water absorption step of the rice cooking step, the germ rice is kept within the range of 40 ° C. ± 10 ° C. for a predetermined time within the range of 30 minutes to 5 hours. Since an activation step of heating at a predetermined temperature for activation is provided, rice with a high GABA content and high nutritional value can be provided.

Further, the predetermined time of the activation step is preferably within a range of 2 hours ± 1 hour, and since the rice is cooked in a short time, it is possible to cook the activated rice for every three meals a day. Becomes

[Brief description of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a schematic view of a rice cooker according to an embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a plan view showing a display unit of the lid body of FIG.

FIG. 3 is a graph showing temperature control by the control circuit of the rice cooker of FIG. 1.

FIG. 4 is a graph showing the change in content of γ-amino acid in 100 g of embryo with time when immersed in water at 40 ° C.

[Explanation of symbols]

1 rice cooker 5 heating means 6 Temperature detection means 7 control circuit

Continued front page    (72) Inventor Kitayama Kei             Elephant 1-20-5 Tenma, Kita-ku, Osaka City, Osaka Prefecture             In Mahobin Co., Ltd. F term (reference) 4B055 AA03 BA64 BA73 BA74 GC02                       GC26

Claims (3)

[Claims] 1. A rice cooker that cooks rice in a preset rice cooking process, wherein before the water absorption process of the rice cooking process, the germinated rice is in the range of 40 ° C. ± 10 ° C. for a predetermined time within the range of 30 minutes to 5 hours. A rice cooker characterized by being provided with an activation step of activating it by heating it at a predetermined temperature. 2. The rice cooker according to claim 1, wherein the germinated rice includes brown rice and fractionated rice. 3. The predetermined time is preferably 2 hours ± 1
Within a time range, the predetermined temperature is preferably 40
The rice cooker according to claim 1 or 2, wherein the rice cooker has a temperature range of ± 5 ° C.