Rice cooker on the go for family

For most people, traveling while on a holiday comes together with eating out. This is true if you are traveling to other countries with different culture, ambience, and importantly food.

Anyway, thanks to globalization, there is no food that is not available in Malaysia and Singapore. We have Middle Eastern, Indian, Japanese, Chinese, Thai, Pinoy (or Phillipines), Indonesian, Western, French, and many more. For those people, like me, who would prefer that once in a while to have a home-cooked meal that is heavy on the spices and hot chillies during travel (especially for a duration of more than 5 days) there must be a way to accomplish this...

When I was in Spain few months back, and after having taken so many Tapas and Paella (which were really great and tasty but still....), I was so desperate to look for Asian/Indian restaurants that I was willing to walk long distances to taste home. Unfortunately the food there was still foreign to me. That was when I realized that the only way to take home cooked meal with me (if there was a craving), was to get a mini rice cooker. One that can fit into a luggage and sufficient to cook for at least two people.

The advantages of rice cooker is plenty:

1. It can boil water. This is important for travelers with babies and who need to prepare milk (from formula milk powder).
2. Instant noodle. Any craving for noodles, rice cooker to the rescue.
3. Hot pot (or steam boat). You can find any fresh ingredients to your liking (in the market) and dump them into the prepared broth (after adding the prepacked spices or broth base). It will be super!
4. Steamer. If you have craving for anything that need steaming, the rice cooker to the rescue!
5. BBQ/frying. I have not tried it on a "basic" cooker (those portable ones with minimal function) before, but with a little bit of cooking oil and ingredient, I guess you can start stir fry them in the pot and it should work.
6. Bake. My wife had tried baking a bread with the rice cooker. It won't be as fluffy as baking them in the oven, but it is still tasty. However, I don't think bread is hard to get item in the world. Bread can be found all over the world!

There are several references describing what you can do with a rice cooker. I will list some of them here.

• 21 Surprising Things You Can Make In A Rice Cooker
• Frying foods in a rice cooker (eHow)
• Rice cooker recipes (Zojirushi)

Other tips

• How to opt for Digi super long life plan. This is a prepaid plan and you can increase the validity duration by opting for Digi super long life plan (to 365 days) at a cost of RM 30.
• Type of cameras that is most useful during travel.
• List of important things to take while traveling oversea.