Rice cookers are a convenient and inexpensive way to cook food for those confined to small spaces or without access to conventional kitchens, so I’m going to develop a few recipes specifically for rice cookers, starting with this super easy Teriyaki Shrimp and Rice. This ultra simple dish is similar to shrimp fried rice that you’d get from your local take out joint, except it’s steamed not fried, and therefore way less caloric. The ultra short ingredient list means you don’t have to have a lot of ingredients on hand, and most of them can be kept indefinitely either in your pantry or freezer.
Check out my other Rice Cooker Recipes: Rice Cooker Chili, Rice Cooker Mac and Cheese, Rice Cooker Spanish Chickpeas and Rice.
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What Rice Cooker am I Using?
I chose to work with one of the most popular and most basic rice cookers on the market to make sure the recipes I develop have the broadest compatibility. That being said, every model rice cooker is slightly different, and may yield slightly different results. I’m using the Aroma Housewares 8 cup cooked/4 cup uncooked Digital Rice Cooker (affiliate link).
Can I Make This Teriyaki Shrimp and Rice in an Instant Pot?
Using the “rice” function on your Instant Pot will cook food in the same manner as a rice cooker, so this recipe should work just fine in an Instant Pot, providing you are using the rice function and not a pressure cooking function. That being said, I have not had a chance to actually test this recipe using an Instant Pot.
Rice to Water Ratios
There is a lot of conflicting information about what the proper rice to water ratio is for rice cookers, partly due to differing needs for different rice varieties and variations in the way different rice cookers work. I’ve tested this particular recipe several times with different rice to water ratios, and found that 1:1.33 worked best for me. Again, if using a different model rice cooker or a different variety of rice, the ratio may need to be adjusted.
Rice Cooker Teriyaki Shrimp and Rice Recipe
Servings 4 1.5 cups eachIngredients
- 1/2 lb. raw medium shrimp (41/50 size)* ($4.00)
- 1 small onion ($0.33)
- 1 cup frozen peas ($0.38)
- 1.5 cups uncooked jasmine rice ($0.99)
- 2 cloves garlic, minced ($0.16)
- 1 tsp grated fresh ginger ($0.10)
- 2 cups water ($0.00)
- 1/4 cup soy sauce ($0.24)
- 2 Tbsp brown sugar ($0.08)
Instructions
- If your shrimp is frozen, thaw it first by placing in a colander and running cool water over it until thawed (this only takes a few minutes).
- Finely dice the onion and place it in the bottom of the rice cooker along with the frozen peas (I did not thaw my peas). Add the uncooked rice, minced garlic, and grated ginger. Stir these ingredients together.
- Add the shrimp to the top of the rice mixture, then pour in 2 cups water. Close the lid and set the cooker to the “white rice” setting. The rice cooker will begin to heat and once the contents inside reach the appropriate temperature, it will begin to count down the cooking time (12 minutes for my model).
- Once the rice cooker finishes its cooking cycle, let it rest for an additional 5-10 minutes on the keep warm cycle before opening the lid. While waiting, stir together the soy sauce and brown sugar.
- Finally, open the lid and pour the soy sauce mixture over the contents in the rice cooker. Use a rice paddle to gently fold the sauce into the rice. Serve hot, with sriracha or sliced green onions if desired.
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Equipment
Notes
Nutrition
Have you tried this recipe?Mention @budgetbytes or tag #budgetbytes on Instagram!How To Make Shrimp & Rice Teriyaki In A Rice Cooker – Step by Step Photos
If using frozen shrimp, thaw them first by placing them in a colander and running cool water over top until thawed (this only takes a couple of minutes). Finely dice one small onion and place it in the rice cooker along with 1 cup frozen peas (I did not thaw the peas).
Add 1.5 cups white jasmine rice to the cooker, along with two cloves of garlic (minced) and about 1 tsp grated fresh ginger. Stir these ingredients together until everything is evenly combined.
Add 1/2 lb. medium shrimp (41/50 size) to the rice cooker, then pour 2 cups water over top.
Close the rice cooker and set it to the “white rice” function. The rice cooker will begin to heat up, and once it reaches the appropriate temperature it will begin to count down the actual cooking time (mine is 12 minutes for the white rice function). Depending on the temperature and volume of the ingredients in the cooker, it can take a different amount of time to come up to temperature before it begins counting the actual “cooking time.”
After the cooking cycle has finished, make sure to let it sit without opening the lid for an additional 5-10 minutes. This really helps give you more even results because it gives the steam a chance to settle in the cooker. While waiting for the rice to rest in the cooker, stir together 1/4 cup soy sauce and 2 Tbsp brown sugar in a small bowl. It’s okay if the sugar doesn’t totally dissolve.
Pour the soy sauce mixture over the contents of the rice cooker, then use your rice paddle to gently fold the sauce into the shrimp and rice.
If you’re at the max volume of your rice cooker, like I was, it may be easier to transfer everything to a large bowl to fold in the soy sauce, but that’s up to you. Once the sauce is incorporated, the Teriyaki Shrimp and Rice is ready to eat!!
Of course I topped mine with some sriracha, but that’s optional! A couple sliced green onions or cilantro would also be nice if you have them on hand.
Dig in!!
Tried this recipe tonight, it is going to be one of our favourites! Loved it so Good!!!
This sounds really good, but I live alone and tend to make a meal Sunday nights as lunch for the week (I also can’t eat 4 servings at once lol). How would you reheat the leftovers?
Personally, I just reheat my leftovers in the microwave. I just start with a minute, stir, and add more time if needed.
Hey Beth, thanks for sharing this recipe. It looks delicious.i didn’t know how to make that.your tips will help me to make that correctly. Keep posting like this.good wishes.. :)
I love this site and have gotten so many great recipes from it—looking forward to trying this one! But I’ve got to ask—not just the site, but every restaurant/blog/cooking show of the past two decades:
WTF is so awesome about leaving shrimp tails on?
Is the idea that the shrimp look radically different this way? They don’t. What exactly is the perceived improvement? And most crucially, how has anyone, ever, decided that this minuscule visual difference is worth making the shrimp so much harder to eat? It’s one thing with boiled shrimp l, where the peeling is part of the dining process, and it’s always eaten by hand. But leaving tails on shrimp in dishes meant to be eaten with forks basically gives diners two options: (1) get your hands down in food they’re not meant to be in, or (2) leave tasty shrimp uneaten in the tail that gets sliced off by knife or fork. These options are both lousy.
So why? Why? Seriously, I would love one food pro—just one, anywhere—explain to me why leaving the tails on shrimp is a good thing to do. To me, it prioritizes a rather arbitrary visual difference over both flavor and ease of eating, which IMO is not the point of cooking.
Haha! I love it. There is actually a lot of info about this online (mostly discussions, rants, etc.) because it does annoy so many people! For some dishes, leaving the tail on can act as a little handle to eat the shrimp, for other recipes the shell and/or tail can actually add flavor to the dish (you can use shells and tails to make seafood broths, too), but sometimes it’s pure aesthetics. I think people don’t give enough credit to how much aesthetics add to the enjoyment of food, BUT if it’s greatly outweighed by the annoyance of eating the dish, it’s totally not worth it. But that’s always going to be a personal call. ;)
This did not turn out very well. As I expected they might be, the shrimp were so overcooked, they were inedible. But 12 minutes of boiling as the rice cooks will do that to shrimp (typically you only boil shrimp for 2-3 minutes). The rice flavor was fairly meh too. I think sauteering the onions and garlic and ginger would go a long way.
If I try this recipe again, would definitely want to separate out the shrimp and likely pan-sear it for extra flavor.
Can’t wait to try this recipe. One question. Can I use wild rice? Thanks
You won’t be able to just swap out the white rice for wild rice because wild rice needs a different cooking time and a different amount of liquid. So it would take some testing to get those measurements right, and then figure out how that might affect the other ingredients in the recipe, like the shrimp.
Hi Beth, I made this in my simple rice cooker ( only off/on buttons. It worked great. Also my shrimp were already cooked, but I made the recipe as written and shrimp were fine. Love this, so delicious! Thank you for budget wise tasty recipes!!
Awesome! Good to know that it worked with pre-cooked shrimp as well! :)
I, too, have an Aroma 8-cup rice cooker and I love it! It it 1.5 cups using the Aroma measuring cup, or a “real” 12 ounces in a standard measuring cup. Rice measuring cups are usually only 6 ounces, or ¾ of a regular cup.
We tried this tonight and really liked it! The only thing we’d change is maybe adding more (and smaller-sized) shrimp next time. Thank you for sharing this recipe!
My rice cooker is quite a bit too small to have this much in it at once. Would this one-pot style recipe be doable on the stove? Would you recommend any changes to make it work? Thanks!
Yes, I often cook one pot rice dishes on the stove and they turn out great. :) Just add the ingredients as instructed in this recipe, bring it up to a boil with a lid on, then as soon as it reaches a boil, turn the heat down to low and let it steam for 15 minutes. After 15 minutes, turn the heat off and let it sit for five minutes before lifting the lid.
What a tasty dish! The shrimp and the rice are so good together. A simple, yet extremely delicious and inexpensive dish to make. Definatelly a keeper!
I made this in my Instant Pot tonight and it turned out pretty good! What I did differently:
1) 1:1 water to rice ratio in the Instant Pot since there’s less water evaporation.
2) I just used the Rice button, which set the pot to 15 minutes. The shrimp turned out slightly overcooked, so next time I’ll probably set it to manual and try something shorter, like maybe 12 minutes.
3) I didn’t have any brown sugar so I just used pre-made teriyaki sauce, which turned out nice.
I made this with a few changes- I used a peas n’ carrots mix instead of all peas and also threw in some finely diced red bell pepper in place of the onion. I accidentally stirred in the shrimp instead of placing on top. I stirred in a scrambled egg after cooking to make it more like “fried rice.” We enjoyed it but the flavors were pretty flat. I didn’t taste any of the ginger/garlic- it was mostly soy sauce and the sirracha I added to mine. I will make again but try to think of other things to add to the sauce that’s added at the end- sesame oil? And maybe use chicken broth instead of water. It’s definitely simple to prepare!
Sesame oil would be awesome, and yes using broth will definitely deepen the flavor. :) You will definitely be missing a lot when you leave out the garlic and ginger. Also, keep in mind that if you add a lot of extra vegetables you will have more volume of food that you are trying to flavor with the same amount of sauce, so the flavor will be diluted.
This recipe sounds wonderful! Always looking for shrimp recipes. My rice cooker is very simple, not digital. Will this work okay in that cooker? Only has off and on buttons!
Since I only used the basic “white rice” function, it should also work with the most basic of rice cookers. :) That being said, every model cooks a little differently, so you may need to tinker with it a bit.
What other types of seafood would you recommend substituting for the shrimp? I think my stepdad would really like this recipe, but he’s allergic. Would something like scallops work?
Yes, I think scallops would also work well. Just like shrimp, they cook quickly, so that should be an easy swap. :)