Invented by a Toshiba engineer, Yoshitada Minami, well, to be precise, collaborated with his wife, after 5 years of research, in 1955. I always thought National was the first ones, as they were very popular when I was a kid.
A 1956 advertisement for Toshiba’s world’s first automatic electric rice cooker, priced at 3,200 yen and capable of cooking 900 grams (2.0 lb) of rice.
The invention and adaptation by the world:
Historical context:
I bought mine in 1997, some 27 years ago in a Chinese store in Rome. It has 1 button for cooking, a light indication during cooking, it doesn’t keep warming the rice after cooking, nor it includes a timer…. Still using it today.
How about yours?
Mine was the ultimate thrift store find from last year. Pristine. $5. It gets used often.
5 Bucks! That is truly an amazing Deal.
I love ours to pieces, turns out perfectly cooked Rice.
Is this thread about electric rice cooker or about Toshiba?
Very interesting reads, thank you!
I bought one of the simple ones with a steamer that fit on top, soon after graduating college. Barely ever used it, and it either went to a roommate or charity when we moved.
It’s interesting that they never caught on in India, where rice is eaten widely, but it’s probably electricity availability / usage and energy conservation – most homes put rice up in the pressure cooker as one of several things that are cooked daily (lentils go in a different separator, veg / potatoes / misc in the other(s), with all of it getting cooked at the same time with the same amount of energy utilization.
I’ll say both.
Yeah u are right, should be more on history of rice cooker. But history doesn’t attract audience. So how about our history with RC?
Got it. I just did not want to say anything off topic. Thanks.
National was the big brand in the US. That’s all I recall seeing back in the day. Although I’ll have to ask my mom. Family might have had a Toshiba, light green avocado color.
My mom send this one to me while in college, 1985….geez, 40 y.o., still working. I think it was the smallest at the time and I used it like 3-4 times in 3 years. Got real use later.
Of course no more crispy rice on the bottom of the stove top pots. But now there’s a few Persian brands that are specifically designed to cook crispy rice, tahdig.
I remember National too, but at least in mind, it is not longer as well known and respected as Tiger or Zojirushi
National was phased out in favor of the Panasonic brand (part of the same conglomerate).
I have a Zojirushi, and it does an excellent job, although really I don’t use that many functions.
My rice cooker story, circa 1983, is that my college Freshman roommate gifted me one as a wedding present. At the time, I didn’t know such things existed, and thought it was kinda twee.
But at some later point, I started using and appreciating it. No telling now, 40+ years on, what happened to it, but I still remember the “ding” sound it made when it finished.
In the run-up to 2025, I’m not sure I’d ever buy a rice cooker, unless I get hooked on tahdeg or other crusty rice rice preps.
When I didn’t have an oven to bake cakes, I used my rice cooker to make them. TBH, I wouldn’t say they are “baked” in them, but the cakes I made in them weren’t half bad! (the old-fashioned simple rice cookers don’t have such functions.)
We use a zojirushi for daily use but its non stick bowl is one of the few Teflon items still in our house.
We also use a Pars brand Persian rice cooker when making Iranian rice because of the ease of making perfect tahdeeg. It’s also Teflon (shucks!).
Finally, I recently picked up a Tatung rice cooker that looks so similar to the Toshiba ER-4 that it makes me suspect Tatung copied the design. I’ve only used it once. They have a bit of a cult following among the Taiwanese community so I couldn’t resist it when I found one thrifting last spring. It has a stainless inner bowl and requires adding water not only on the rice but outside the rice bowl, which is neat.
I love my rice cooker. I’m still shocked when I see people making rice in a pan on the stove…
In addition to making rice in the thing, I use my rice cooker for making lentils and pearl barley.
Lentils I use 2.5 cups of water to 1 cup of lentils.
Pearl Barley 3.25 to 3.5 cups of water to 1 cup of pearl barley.
The lentils and pearl barley take longer than rice, so I have to plan accordingly. In the end, everything comes out perfect.
This is exactly what my family’s rice cooker looked like when we were growing up, except ours had a metallic/silver body and it had to feed our family of 5 so a bigger model. We did rice, occasionally congee (but I always liked the stove top version better) and even sometimes hot pot. I’m not sure that last one worked as well as it could have, but as a kid we were excited anytime anything different from the traditional Chinese meal was served.
I think that pot never officially stopped working, but as we (the kids) grew up and moved out, my parents bought a newer smaller model to cook for them. We also convinced them the newer models worked better. Those RCs were definitely work horses, and we had them for a good 30-40 years too.
I’m still using a small fuzzy logic Zojirushi that I bought maybe 20 years ago. Works perfectly well for both my white and brown rice, short and long grain.
Rice cookers can really cut down the attention. I grew up with a electric rice cooker, and recently I have moved to using donabe to make rice. It definitely takes more attention.
Why the shock? Although I have at least three rice cookers of various capacities - and over the past five decades have owned a Toshiba like in the OP, a National, and a Panasonic, none of which I still own and wonder where in the hell they went - I still make rice on the stovetop sometimes, especially when I have a hankering for koge. I think you can now get rice cookers that specifically have a koge setting (not sure about it, though), but I certainly don’t need yet another rice cooker.
