Soaking brown rice

I have often soaked nuts & other seeds to increase their overall nutritional profile, but up until now I’ve not really looked into the pre-soaking of rice to improve its nutrition, but it seems I should have taken the time to look into this before as rice like other grains benefit from pre-soaking (rice is a grass).
The way to germinate rice is to first get hold of brown rice (preferably organic if you can), then soak it in a warm environment for 20 hours (although 20 hours is ideal, overnight will still improve the nutritional profile considerably). Using this method studies carried out by the United Nations during the year of rice (2004) found that the rice had a far superior nutritional & amino acid profile than rice that had not been soaked, it also found a much higher level of the GABA in the soaked rice (hence one of its names when sold commercially is GABA rice). 1
Once soaked, rinse & the rice can be cooked as normal.

If you’re into training & not come across GABA before here’s a brief introduction from Bodybuilding.com http://www.bodybuilding.com/store/gaba.html that should give you the basics, but beyond that you get increased vitamin & mineral availability & a better overall amino acid profile, which in itself should encourage you to start planning ahead with you meals & begin soaking rice to get the most from your meals.

By the way if you are storing rice for any time after cooking it is best to cool it rapidly as this discourages Bacillus cereus, bacteria that thrives between 4-60 degrees C & can cause stomach issues.

1 http://www.hatsuga.com/DOMER/english/en/GBRRB.html