Welcome back for the first of this year series. It is with some trepidation that I await DK4 and find out if writing food diaries, with pics, is easy or not in the revamped Orange. Being no techie, I personally hate having to change format but I'll give it a try or two since this community is important to me.
No recipes today but the rice background is most interesting and closely follows our ancestor's yearn to settle down, domesticate animals and become agrarian. I have added a slew of fun facts for those who - like me - are curious about this wonder grain whose production is crucial to more than half of the world's population.
Now for the recipes: next week will be about white rice dishes, the following about brown rice, then another dealing with risotto rice (Arborio, Carnaroli etc.), and finally a whole diary will be dedicated to wild rice.
Firstly, rice is that rare food which is gluten-free, though one has to be careful when reading labels: some producers use various coatings to enrich it and I would suggest to visit this site if you are gluten-intolerant. Since white rice is by far the most common of all types (white rice can be kept indefinitely in a cool, dry area), it is consumed in all countries of the world. White rice is de-hulled, has all bran and germ layers removed, and is often enriched (see link above), giving it more nutritional value than it holds on its own. Personally I like brown rice best, for its flavor and concomitant vitamins. Then wild rice, then red rice from Camargues (see pic below).
The first rice is thought to have been grown in East and South Asia some 12,000 years ago, when people began to settle in river deltas and domesticated wild rice (I have perused hundreds of sites for origins of rice though historians hold little or no stock in any data. Most believe the roots of rice come from 3000 BC India, where natives discovered the plant growing in the wild and began to experiment with it, however there is ample data of morphological studies of rice phytoliths from the Diaotonghuan archaeological site which clearly show the transition from the collection of wild rice to the cultivation of domesticated rice around 11,000 to 13,000 years ago.) Eventually I'll do a few diaries on Indian curries and their method of dealing with rice.
While rice is not only a prominent food for the Chinese of today, it is also the first grain that was farmed there in earnest. At that time, inhabitants prepared rice by boiling it in water, which is pretty much the same way we still do it today. Eventually some smart guy discovered that rice can be made into wine, which then became a well-known and popular drink throughout Asia since prehistoric days.
In Japan, rice was introduced about 400 B.C. during the Jomon Period. The Yayoi culture (circa 250 B.C. to AD 250) was characterized by production of iron & bronze weapons and wet cultivation of rice. These two features suggest the beginning of strong Chinese influence (Ch'in and Han dynasties) which filtered through Chinese colonies in Korea.
Cultivation and cooking methods are thought to have spread to the west rapidly and by medieval times, southern Europe saw the introduction of rice as a companion grain to wheat, barley and rye. Today, rice is grown and harvested on every continent except Antarctica, though I'm almost sure that in the not so distant future (climate change) conditions will make its growth possible. Today, the majority of all rice produced comes from India, China, Japan, Indonesia, Thailand, Burma, and Bangladesh. Asian farmers still account for over 90% of the world's total rice production. More than 750 million tons of rice is produced annually around the globe (on par with that other power grain, wheat).
All over the world rice is an ingredient of many soups and dishes with fish, poultry, and other types of meat. It is also used to stuff vegetables or is wrapped in grape leaves (Middle-East). When combined with milk, sugar and honey, it is used to make incredibly good desserts. The recipes and uses of rice are endless in their permutations. Though there are over 140,000 varieties of rice, there are only four major categories worldwide: Indica, Japonica, aromatic and glutinous.
Rice is usually distinguished by the length of its grain i.e. long, medium, or short. Long grain rice produces a light and fluffy consistency because the grains do not stick together. It’s extremely versatile and often used in side dishes like pilaf and fried rice. Compared with white rice which is not a complete protein (it does not contain all of the essential amino acids in sufficient amounts), brown rice is more nutritious because it contains bran, which is a source of fiber, oils, B vitamins, and important minerals. Since a large portion of maize crops are grown for purposes other than human consumption, rice is the most important grain with regard to human nutrition and caloric intake, providing more than one fifth of the calories consumed worldwide by the human species.
Fun Rice Facts:
The first cultivators of rice in America did so by accident after a storm damaged ship docked in the Charleston South Carolina harbor. The captain of the ship handed over a small bag of rice to a local planter as a gift, and by 1726, Charleston was exporting more than 4,000 tons of rice a year.
In India, rice is associated with prosperity and with the Hindu Goddess of Wealth, Lakshmi. Rice is worshiped as Lakshmi during the full moon day following the Durga puja, a Hindu ceremony.
In Japan, it is said that the first cultivator of rice was the Sun Goddess Amatereshu-Omi-Kami. She grew rice in the fields of heaven, giving the first harvest to Prince Ninigi.
In Thailand, the Rice Mother Mae Posop is worshiped as rice itself. It is believed that, like a mother who feeds her children, Mae Posop gives her body and soul to sustain human life. At harvest, Mae Posop is said to be shy and easily frightened by men. Before harvest, no men, loud noises, or talk of death and demons are permitted. Such disturbances are thought to result in and crop failure.
Rice appears to have been used by the Early Neolithic populations of Lijiacun and Yunchanyan. Evidence of possible rice cultivation in China from ca. 11,500 BP has been found, however it is still questioned whether the rice was indeed being cultivated, or instead being gathered as wild rice. Bruce Smith, an archaeologist at the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C., who has written on the origins of agriculture, says that evidence has been mounting that the Yangtze was probably the site of the earliest rice cultivation.
In some parts of the world, the husks and grains of rice are used for bedding, fuels and building board. It can be charred as filtration material or for charcoal briquettes.
Scientists discovered that ancient Chinese structures, including a section of the Great Wall of China, had a special ingredient in the extremely strong mortar: sticky rice.
The average person in Myanmar eats 195 kg of rice each year, compared to our 3 to 4 kg!
The so-called "wild rice" in North America isn’t rice at all—it’s actually a grass in a different genus.
It takes 5,000 liters of water to produce one kilogram of rice.
In Costa Rica there is a popular expression "arroz con mango", which literally means, "rice with mango", that it's used to denote an absurd or nonsensical situation.
I'm sure some of you know this story: a Chinese invented the chess board. The emperor got interested in the game. He was so impressed with the inventor that he was willing to get any of his wish granted. " Ask anything and it will be given, " said the emperor. "I have only a very small desire, the inventor replied. "Keep one grain of rice in the first column, two in the next, four in the third and so on until the last column." The emperor felt it was a very small wish and readily agreed. He asked his servants to keep one grain in the first, 2 in the second, four in the third, eight in the fourth, 16 in the fifth, 32 in the sixth, 64 in the seventh ....128,.... 256.....512....1024....2048......4096.... ... 8112.... 16224... and 32448 in the 16th column. The number of grains just got doubled and when it reached the 25th column it became a ton of rice. He had to get 128 tons of rice for the 32nd column and 32768 tones in the 40th column. The entire rice produced in China and the whole world did not suffice for the 60th column. There were four more to go. The emperor accepted defeat.
Lastly, I dare you to click on this kind of rice!