Rice and Nutrition
Rice may well be the most ancient of food grains, and next to whet, it is the grain grown in largest quantity throughout the world today.
It may be the major as aspect of a diet, or incorporated into the man dish, side dish, or dessert and is commonly used in the preparation of ready to eat breakfast cereals.
Rice is especially important to persons with wheat allergies and is commonly eaten as a first food by infants, as it offers the least cereal allergy.
Rice may be eaten as the whole grain, or polished shedding the bran. Generally, rice is polished during milling in order to remove the brown hull, which also removes some of the protein, vitamins and minerals. (The once-prevalent deadly disease beri-beri resulted from eating polished rice (thiamin removed in the milling process) as a staple food.)
Today, most white rice is enriched with vitamins and minerals, to add back nutrients lost in milling.
Unpolished, whole rice is more subject to flavor deterioration and insect infestation than polished, white rice.
The primary place of origin of rice is Southeast Asia, where an average of more than 200 pounds per person a year are eaten.
China, India, Japan and Vietnam are some of the major rice consuming countries.
Warmer climates with abundant water are ideal for rice growth. Larger crops are now being cultivated in California and the southern United States and a number of varieties of rice are now commonly available.
Sweet rice is more glutinous than other varieties and is used mostly for dessert such as rice pudding.
Long and short grain brown rice are also commonly available, with many varieties providing different flavors.
Besides just being boiled to be eaten with vegetables, tofu, fish and so on, rice an be popped and used as a breakfast cereal cream of rice, another breakfast cereal, is made form ground rice.
Rice and Nutrition
