Sticky Rice Xoi Recipe: Steamed Xôi, Step by Step

A proper sticky rice xoi recipe is the opposite of a bowl of rice. You are not trying to keep the grains separate. You want them plump, shiny, tender and just clinging together, with a faint nutty sweetness from the rice itself.

Xôi is sold from baskets and carts on mornings across Vietnam. A scoop goes into a paper wrapper or a bowl with toppings: fried shallots, mung bean paste, peanuts and sesame, or sweet coconut. People eat it standing, on a motorbike seat, on the way to work. It is breakfast, snack and offering. The same glutinous rice, gạo nếp, forms the heart of bánh chưng at Tết, which we cover in our rice culture and Tết guide.

For background on the grain, see our Vietnamese rice varieties guide. For the big picture, start with the complete Vietnamese rice guide.

Toppings are where xôi becomes personal. A savoury version might come with fried shallots and their oil, roasted peanuts crushed with sesame and a pinch of salt, or a layer of mung bean paste. A sweet version might carry grated coconut and sugar. Some versions are coloured with natural ingredients, and some are shaped into small packets wrapped in leaves. Which you choose depends on the time of day, the occasion and who is eating.

For a first attempt, keep it simple: plain xôi with fried shallot oil and a handful of peanuts and sesame. Once you know how the rice behaves, you can improvise.

Buy rice that says glutinous, sticky or sweet rice on the bag. The grains should look short, plump and opaque white. Thai and Vietnamese glutinous rice both work. Do not substitute sushi rice; it is sticky in a different way and will not give you xôi.

Soaking is not optional. Dry glutinous rice steams unevenly: some grains turn tender while others stay chalky. As a rule of thumb, soak for 6 to 8 hours, which in practice means overnight. Use cool water, enough to cover the rice generously, because the grains drink a lot. Drain well before steaming.

One caution. Timings for soaking and steaming vary with the age of the rice and the pot. Treat the numbers here as a starting point and let the texture decide. Taste a grain at the end of steaming. It should be tender all the way through with no hard core.

Once the rice is soaked and drained, resist the urge to rush. Set up the steamer, check the water, and have the lid and cloth ready. Steaming is mostly waiting, and the best use of that time is to prepare the toppings: slice the shallots, roast the peanuts, crush the sesame. Everything should be ready to spoon over the rice the moment it comes out of the steam, because xôi is at its best hot, shiny and just soft enough to hold its shape in a spoon. Cold, it stiffens, and a stiff bowl of xôi is the most common reason people say they do not like it.

A note on water quality and quantity. Use plenty of cool water for soaking: the grains absorb it and swell, and rice that lacks water at this stage will not steam through. Cover the rice with a generous layer of water, and add more if the level drops. Then drain thoroughly. Rice that goes into the steamer dripping wet will turn soggy at the bottom.

If you are in a hurry, warm water speeds soaking a little, but it also changes the texture slightly. Cool water over a longer time gives the most reliable result.

Why does glutinous rice behave so differently? The answer is starch. Ordinary rice contains two kinds, amylose and amylopectin. Glutinous rice is almost all amylopectin, a branched starch that swells, turns translucent and binds the grains together as it cooks. That is why the grains cling, and why the cooked rice looks glossy rather than fluffy. It also explains the soak: amylopectin needs water inside the kernel before it can gelatinise evenly. A grain that is dry in the centre stays white and chalky while its outside softens.

You can judge the rice before and after steaming with your eyes. Dry grains should be opaque, bright white and fairly uniform. After a proper soak they look slightly swollen and a little less white, and when you press one between your fingers it crumbles with no hard core. Cooked, the rice turns from opaque to a soft translucent glow. Chalky white spots in the finished pot are the clearest warning that the soak was too short, or that the rice was piled too thickly in the steamer. The fix is simple: sprinkle a few spoonfuls of hot water over the rice, close the lid and steam again for a few minutes.

Why the hole in the middle? It lets steam rise through the rice instead of finding its own way around the edges, which gives more even cooking. Why turn the rice halfway? The grains nearest the bottom get the most steam, and turning them helps everything cook at the same pace. Why the cloth? It keeps grains from falling through the holes of the steamer and from sticking to the bottom.

When the rice is done, it should look glossy and slightly translucent, feel tender all the way through, and cling together without being gluey. If you pinch a grain between your fingers, it should squash easily. If it is still chalky in the middle, steam a little longer with the lid on.

You can improvise. Put a metal colander over a pot, line it with a cloth, add the soaked rice, and cover with a snug lid or a plate. Keep the water below the colander, and watch the level. It is not as elegant as a basket, but it makes edible xôi.

You can also cook glutinous rice in a rice cooker. Many cookers have a sweet-rice or sticky-rice programme, and the result can be good, but it is a different texture: closer to cooked rice than to true steamed xôi. Our rice cooker buying guide explains the programmes you may meet.

The usual mistakes are quick to list. Skipping the soak leaves hard centres. Letting the rice touch the water makes it soggy. Lifting the lid constantly lets steam escape. Using the wrong rice makes a different dish. And if you want to continue the sticky-rice theme at the New Year table, our rice culture and Tết guide shows where it ends up.

Serving ideas beyond breakfast. Xôi works as a side for grilled meat and braised dishes. Sweet xôi makes a simple dessert with fresh fruit. Leftover xôi can be pressed into a flat cake and pan-fried until crisp on the outside and soft within. Keep leftover xôi covered, since it hardens quickly when exposed to air, and warm it briefly in the steamer to bring it back.

Storage: let the rice cool, wrap it, and refrigerate. Re-steam for a few minutes before serving. It will not be quite as good as fresh, but it will do. Glutinous rice dries out and hardens faster than ordinary rice, so do not leave it uncovered.