In Viet cuisine, what's the deal with broken rice?

Question

I see Vietnamese restaurants often use broken rice in their rice plates. Is broken rice a lower grade version of rice or do they break it on purpose so that dishes are served this way? What's the idea behind it? Do the Vietnamese actually prefer their rice texture to be broken? Why would that be the case? Any natives with some answers?

Answer

My Viet friends tell me that it is a different technique in cooking the rice. Here is an article from LA Weekly
http://www.laweekly.com/eat+drink/counter-intelligence/vietnamese-rice-in-san-gabriel/12186/

Answer

According to my in-laws, it was originally rice grains that were broken during the harvest and cleaning of the rice. Although still edible, they didn't look as good, so they were cheaper to buy. Naturally, this was very popular among the poorer folks. But other social classes began eating it because it is very tasty. Some folks prefer broken rice to regular rice. It definitely tastes different from unbroken rice.

Answer

Broken rice is rice that wasn't dried properly. It sells for less. In Vietnam, where a lot of rice is dried on the highways and sometimies gets rained on. high brokens result. Also in Vietnam, I never had cooked broken being thought of as desirable.

Answer

I wonder if it is also that the rice has sat all day in a rice cooker and become clumpy and broken.

Answer

In Viet Nam, broken rice is a cheaper than whole. It used to be that only poorer people would buy it, but it has gained favor in wider circles as it has a different texture and slightly starchier consistency than the preferred long grain rice. 

Do Vietnamese prefer rice texture to be broken? Not necessarily. But traditionally, there are places who specialize in rice plates with broken rice and traditional foods: grilled meats, eggrolls, pickled vegetables, etc. These became popular in Southern Viet Nam, particularly in Saigon. Many of the immigrants in the US are from the South and have brought over these nostaglic dishes. 

Broken rice is only eaten with those particular foods - the bbq and eggroll-type dishes I mentioned. It's not eaten on a regular basis with typical every-day food. Not in my family anyway. Growing up, I never had broken rice at home. But once in awhile we'd go to a broken rice restaurant.

Answer

I just came upon this post while I was stalking broken rice on the internet. I just wanted to shout out my love for Com Tam (broken rice). I go to only 1 vietnamese restaurant in a city full of them just because they serve it with their lemongrass beef dishes. I know it's the lower grade rice, but the texture of the broken pieces of rice is spectacular and I'm pretty hooked. I think it's sturdier per grain than whole grains of rice, so when the egg yolk pops and pours over everything, the combination is to die for.

Answer

Broken rice is imported into Okinawa from Thailand and other SE Asian countries to make the Awamori distilled spirit. The main reason is because it is really cheap, apparently.

Answer

It is a dish that, well, is made with broken rice. It tends to be mushy and sticky in consistency. Typically it is served with vegetables and a protein on top of it. Broken rice is comprised of the small fragments that break off when shipping rice around.

Answer

Broken rice in Vietnamese cuisine is known as Com Tam. Broken rice is a byproduct of normal rice manufacturing and was often thought as undesirable and, consequently, was typically only utilized by low-income households. However, the use of broken rice became popularized after the end of the Vietnam war. The end of the war caused devastating effects to the country. Along with damage and destruction of rice fields (during wartime), Vietnam was also faced financial hardship. This lead to the wide spread utilization of the cheap and readily-available broken rice (com tam) across Vietnam. Broken rice has now became a staple item in Vietnamese cuisine as its cooking techniques have been mastered and, when cooked properly, preferred in taste.

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In Viet cuisine, what's the deal with broken rice?

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