My Homemade Version of Uncle Ben’s Rice

Very seldom do I buy a package of the flavored rice mixes in the store anymore, but when I do it’s the Uncle Ben’s Long Grain & Wild Rice original flavor that I reach for first.  It must be those 23 herbs and seasonings that always sound so good!

I finally decided if that was a rice mixture I liked (a lot!), then it was time to see if I could Make My Own.  Some internet searching turned up the same recipe over and over, which I soon discovered had one major problem.  The recipes I kept finding combined white long grain rice with wild rice and then had you cooking that mixture for about 15 to 20 minutes.

No way does that work.

Wild rice takes almost 50 minutes to cook.  My first attempts made me realize that if you just dump wild rice in with the white rice thinking everything is going to be good and dandy after 20 minutes, you’ll be disappointed.  The wild rice will be crunchy and undercooked.   *Blech*

I puzzled over this little problem for awhile wondering about the best solution.  Should I just cook everything for 50 minutes?  That probably would’ve worked but I was turned off by the idea that making some rice for dinner was now going to take almost an hour.

Some online info said that buying “cracked” wild rice was the answer.  I looked high and low in my local stores and no such thing was to be found.

So I mustered all my brain power and came up with this fix – I precooked the wild rice and froze it.

Now when we want some copycat Uncle Ben’s Rice, I pull a baggie of the cooked wild rice out of my freezer, zap it in the microwave for about 45 seconds to take the chill off, and just add it in to my flavored white rice blend that’s simmering on the stove.  Success!

Here’s my method and recipe so you can make your own Uncle Ben’s wild rice mix too.

Homemade Uncle Ben's Rice

 

Precook The Wild Rice

You Will need:

 

Put the water in a saucepan and bring to a boil on the stove.  Stir in the wild rice, cover, and reduce the heat to a simmer.  Let the wild rice simmer on low heat for 50 minutes.  Remove from heat and let cool slightly.

You should see that the rice has now cracked open so it won’t be hard and crunchy in your recipes.

 Homemade Uncle Ben's Rice

I divided the cooked rice into four snack size ziploc bags.  The 1/2 cup of uncooked wild rice I started with yielded about 3 tablespoons of cooked wild rice per baggie.

Flatten the baggies a bit so you can stack them, and put in the freezer.

 Homemade Uncle Ben's Rice

 

Now that you have your wild rice cooked and ready to go, you can use it in the following recipe.  This is ramped up version of my basic flavored rice.  These are some of the spices I like to use that I think mimic the Uncle Ben’s blend, but you can certainly adjust the spices to your own liking.

Homemade Uncle Ben's Rice

My Homemade Version of Uncle Ben’s Rice

You Will Need:

  • 1 cup Water

  • 1 tablespoon Butter

  • 2 teaspoons Chicken Base or Chicken Bouillon Powder

  • 1 teaspoon Dried Parsley

  • 1/2 teaspoon Onion Powder

  • 1/2 teaspoon Garlic Salt

  • 1/2 teaspoon Basil

  • 1/2 teaspoon Rubbed Sage

  • 1/2 teaspoon Celery Salt

  • 1/2 cup Long Grain White Rice

  • 1 packet of Precooked Wild Rice from the instructions above

Combine the water, butter, chicken base or bouillon, and spices in a saucepan and bring to a boil on the stove.  Stir in the white rice, cover, and reduce the heat to a simmer.

Take a baggie of precooked wild rice from the freezer.  Empty the rice from the baggie onto a plate (you may need to break it apart a little bit) and microwave for about 45 seconds.

Then add the wild rice to the mixture that’s simmering on the stove.  You can do this either at the beginning of the cooking time or towards the end of the cooking time.  It didn’t seem to matter.

Let everything simmer for about 20 minutes or until the white rice has absorbed the liquid.

Remove from the heat, fluff with a fork, and serve.

 

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15 Comments

  1. You can always cook the wild rice for 20 minutes and then add the white rice and cook everything for another 25 minutes. It’s not as fast, but it works. I’ve done that for years, but it’s not as good without the 23 herbs and seasonings, which is where your recipe comes in!

  2. Thank you!! The seasonings are spot on in this recipe! I LOVE Uncle Ben’s Wild Rice & this is as close as you get – but without all the stuff you don’t want!
    Instead of making the wild rice first, I cooked a 1/2 cup of the Lundberg wild rice blend with the seasonings & butter in 2 cups chicken broth for 20 minutes then added 1/2 cup Zatarain’s parboiled rice & cooked another 20 minutes. Should have cooked the wild rice a little longer. Maybe 25-30 minutes.
    A little crunchy, lol but it was still delicious 🤤
    I’ve definitely pinned this to my favorites & I’ll never go back to using a box mix again!

  3. Thank you for the added tip to cook the wild rice first. That should have been a no brained, but sometimes our brains aren’t thinking. Lol! I will share your tip with my Weight watcher friends

  4. Thank you so much for this recipe! I make everything from scratch and try to do organic when possible, so was thrilled to find this seasoning packet recipe. I use it in my Chicken and Wild Rice Soup and look forward to trying this soon. So appreciate you sharing it!

  5. I have been making this for a while now and absolutely love it. I use Lundberg’s wild rice blend since it is readily available in my area. I used to be able to get bigger packets of wild rice but can’t seem to find them anymore..Oh well adapt, adjust, and so on. The Lundberg’s has a cooking time of about 40 minutes. I set a timer for 20 minutes and add my white rice then. I’m blessed with a nice big pot of wonderful yummy rice-everytime!!!. Thanks for your time and effort.

  6. Good job on the wild rice! I live in MN and have cooked wild rice for many years! I have been reading copycat Uncle Bens recipes and keep wondering if there is a dried precooked wild rice? There is no way wild rice would ever cook in the amount of time listed in any of those other recipes. Some of the times aren’t even long enough for regular rice. Also I look forward to trying your spice blend. I do not understand why one would ever put ginger in an uncle bens copycat recipe.

  7. Nice recipe. My version would be to put in fresh where there is dried and salt seasonings. Garlic salt has too much sodium. A clove or two mashed would do better for flavor, in my opinion than the salt. But I am pleased I did find someone who knows how to substitute hydrolyzed with the real deal. Thanks for sharing.

  8. We tried this last night. What I did was take some wild rice and soak it in the morning, then I added it to the regular rice to cook it for 15-20 minutes at supper time. I wonder if after it’s been soaked, I could dry it out again and add it to long grain rice in a package with the herbs mixed up together so it would be easy and ready to go.

    1. I think that would probably work Sarah as the rice has been softened from its original state. I hope it works if you give it a try!

  9. Very good, although next time I wouldn’t add any basil. It overpowered it. And I added some turmeric and a little garlic powder.