Broken Rice substitute

Best substitute

Jasmine Rice, Pulsed to Break the Grains

Use the same amount by dry volume, then reduce cooking water by about 10 percent as the broken rice you are replacing

Best for com tam

Close match

The simplest substitute for broken rice is regular jasmine rice pulsed a few times in a food processor or blender to crack the grains, then cooked with about ten percent less water than usual. If you would rather not break anything, cook plain jasmine rice with a splash of extra water so it comes out softer and slightly clumpy, which gets you most of the way there. The job broken rice is doing is textural: the fragments cook faster, absorb sauce more readily and cling together into a soft mass that holds nuoc cham and grilled pork juices. Japanese short-grain rice is the best whole-grain alternative for that clinginess.

Other broken rice substitutes

Ranked, with the exact amount to use

2Regular Jasmine Rice, Cooked Softer
Different texture
Use the same amount by dry volume, with about 15 percent more water
The no-effort version, using the rice you already have.
What changes
Best for
com tam, weeknight cooking, rice with grilled pork or chicken
Cook jasmine rice with extra water and let it steam covered for a full ten minutes off the heat. It will be softer and stickier than usual, which mimics broken rice reasonably well. What you do not get is the fine, almost couscous-like fragmentation that makes real com tam feel distinctive, so the plate eats like normal rice with grilled pork rather than like the Saigon dish. Nobody will complain.
3Japanese Short-Grain or Sushi Rice
Different taste
Use the same amount by dry volume, with slightly less water
Sticky japonica rice, the best match for the clinging quality.
What changes
Best for
com tam-style plates, rice bowls, anywhere the rice should hold together
Short-grain japonica clumps softly and takes sauce beautifully, which is the main thing broken rice does. The differences are real though: the grains are whole and rounder, the mouthfeel is bouncier and chewier rather than crumbly-soft, and there is no jasmine perfume at all, so the plate smells noticeably plainer. Excellent texture, wrong aroma.
4Calrose or Other Medium-Grain Rice
Different taste
Use the same amount by dry volume
Medium-grain rice that sits between long and short in stickiness.
What changes
Best for
com tam, rice plates, family cooking, budget option
A sensible middle path and cheap in large bags. It cooks softer and clings more than jasmine but stays looser than sushi rice, so a plate of it under grilled pork and pickles behaves much like broken rice. Flavour is neutral and clean without jasmine's floral note, so if the aroma matters, cook it with a pandan leaf or a spoonful of jasmine rice mixed in.
5Coarse Bulgur or Fine Couscous
Different taste
Use the same amount by dry volume
Non-rice grains that mimic the small-fragment texture, not the flavour.
What changes
Best for
improvised plates, when no suitable rice is available
Both give you the small, soft, sauce-absorbing fragments that make broken rice work, and both cook in ten minutes or less. The honest caveat is that they taste like wheat, nutty and slightly toasty, which sits oddly against nuoc cham and Vietnamese grilled pork. It is a workable dinner but a clear departure, and worth choosing only if the alternative is no starch at all.

What is Broken Rice?

Broken Rice is Broken rice is rice whose grains have fractured into small fragments during milling, sold deliberately as com tam in Vietnam, as riz brise in French-speaking West Africa and as broken jasmine rice in Asian supermarkets, and valued for its soft, slightly clumping texture rather than treated as a defect.

Cooking tips

Broken rice is not doing a flavour job, it is doing a texture job, and knowing that makes the substitution easy. Because each grain is in pieces, it cooks faster, soaks up sauce faster and softens into a slightly clumped mass that clings to a fork and holds every drop of nuoc cham and grilled meat juice. Any rice that ends up soft and mildly sticky can take that role; what fails is rice cooked to be dry and separate, like a fluffed pilaf or parboiled long-grain.
Broken rice needs less water than whole rice, not more, because the fragments have far more exposed surface. Start at about 1.25 cups of water per cup of rice rather than the usual 1.5, whether you are using real broken rice or the pulsed version.
Rinse broken rice, or home-cracked rice, more thoroughly than you would ordinary rice. Milling and pulsing both leave loose starch powder on the fragments, and skipping the rinse is the reason improvised com tam sometimes comes out gluey rather than soft and distinct.
If you are pulsing your own, go in short bursts and stop while there are still plenty of whole grains left. A mix of whole and broken grains is exactly what com tam looks like, and over-pulsing gives you rice flour, which cooks into porridge.
For com tam specifically, the rice is meant to be served warm and soft as a bed for grilled pork chops, shredded pork skin, a fried egg and pickled vegetables, with nuoc cham poured over. That means slightly wetter and softer than you would serve rice alongside a stir-fry, so err towards more steaming time rather than less.
Broken rice also makes the fastest congee you will ever cook, breaking down into a smooth savoury porridge in around 25 minutes instead of an hour. If your substitute is whole rice and you are making congee, crack it first, since that shortcut is the main practical reason cooks keep a bag of broken rice.

Frequently asked questions

Can I just use normal rice instead of broken rice?

Yes, and for most home cooking that is exactly what you should do. Cook jasmine rice with a little extra water so it comes out soft and slightly sticky and the dish works fine. You lose the specific fine, crumbly, sauce-drinking texture that makes com tam feel like com tam, but nothing about the dish breaks. If you want the real texture with the rice you already own, pulse it dry in a food processor for a few seconds first.

Is broken rice lower quality or somehow worse than whole rice?

It is cheaper because the fragments are a milling by-product, but it is not inferior, and treating it as inferior misses the point. Vietnamese cooks buy it on purpose for com tam because the texture suits the dish, and it is a staple of its own in parts of West Africa as riz brise. Nutritionally it is the same rice. The only practical downsides are that it needs less water and it will not stay in neat separate grains.

How is broken rice different from rice flour or cream of rice?

It is a matter of degree. Broken rice is grains snapped into two or three visible pieces that still cook and eat as rice. Cream of rice is coarsely ground rice that cooks into a hot cereal, and rice flour is milled to powder for batters and noodles. If you pulse rice too long you cross from the first into the second, which is why you should stop while whole grains remain.

Can I substitute broken rice for regular rice in sushi, risotto or fried rice?

Fried rice, yes, and day-old broken rice fries surprisingly well, though the small pieces catch and brown fast so keep the pan moving. Sushi, no, because the fragments will not hold together in a neat block or clump around a filling properly. Risotto, no, because the broken grains dump all their starch at once and turn to porridge in a few minutes rather than building creaminess gradually.

Where do I buy broken rice, and what is it labelled?

Any Vietnamese, Thai or Chinese supermarket, usually as broken rice, com tam, or broken jasmine rice, and sometimes graded as A1 Super or with a fraction such as 100 percent broken. West African shops sell it as riz brise. It is inexpensive and keeps well, so if you cook com tam more than once it is worth buying a bag rather than pulsing every time.

Related substitutes

More grains & starches substitutes

Broken Rice substitute

Other broken rice substitutes

2Regular Jasmine Rice, Cooked Softer

3Japanese Short-Grain or Sushi Rice

4Calrose or Other Medium-Grain Rice

5Coarse Bulgur or Fine Couscous