Rice

“Rice bitters = Andrographis paniculata. Rice and peas = Antigonon leptopus, a vine. Neither has anything to do with dinner.”

“Rice bitters (Andrographis paniculata). A yard bitter. The 2015 Jamaica survey was the first TRAMIL survey anywhere to find it in significant use. No preparation or pregnancy data in the notes, and pregnancy is always-refer. Mostly minor stomach upset reported.”

“First bowl of rice with soup only, then the side dishes: "good for the body and good for being poor".”

“Nanakusa-gayu (七草粥, seven-herb rice porridge), 7 January, festival of Jinjitsu no sekku. A Chinese seven-green soup custom, offered to the gods by Emperor Uda in early Heian times, an Edo shogunal ritual that spread to commoners. The seven herbs: seri, nazuna, gogyo, hakobera (chickweed, noted for vitamin A and stomach ache), hotokenoza, suzuna (turnip), suzushiro (daikon). Rationale: greens when vegetables were scarce, rest for a stomach tired from New Year food.”

“Arroz blanco, dieta blanda, agua de arroz: plain rice, boiled potato, toast, cooked apple, boiled chicken for a day or two, and the cloudy salted water the rice was boiled in, sipped. With vomiting or diarrhoea, drinking enough comes first, and for a child or an older person agua de arroz never replaces ORS.”

“Karnemelk, beschuit, rijstwater, geraspte appel. Oral tradition in the Peel, no written source found. The comfort food of a sick belly. Next to it, always drinking: two to three litres a day and a glass after every watery stool, no soft or energy drinks, ORS from the drogist for watery diarrhoea and vomiting, above all for children and the old.”

“Rice against diarrhoea, Baba's food for a loose belly. With loose stool the drinking matters most, and the pharmacist has oral rehydration salts for it.”

“Every region its own: rice in the south. Cornmeal, millet or sorghum in the north. Black rice with Job's tears in Yunnan. A fermented, sour congee, suan zhou, in Shanxi and Inner Mongolia.”

“Alongside: a bowl of plain congee, a chicken soup with ginger, warm drinks through the day.”

“Rice, dal and vegetables: the everyday food of exile in India. "In Tibet we ate barley. In India we learned lentils. The lentils were very welcome."”

“Food for old age. Warm, regular, enough. Soups, porridge, soft cooked vegetables, beans and lentils, eggs, dairy if it suits you, bread, rice. Many older people eat too little, and Dutch health advice stresses enough protein for older people. Many older people also feel less thirst and drink too little: a warm drink at fixed times helps. Ask the GP about vitamin D, which Dutch guidance advises extra for older people. "At my age the problem is not eating too much. It is forgetting to eat at all, because the tea is more interesting."”

“The warning. The berries in the rice are food. Berberine pills and "barberry extract" capsules are something else: the berberine in barberry sits mostly in the root and root bark, and EFSA could set no safe daily amount for berberine from plant preparations (draft opinion, January 2026).”

“Never a jar alone. Saffron in the rice is a joy of the kitchen, and lasting low mood is never left only to a spice or a tea. Gol gav zaban is not a daily mood tea. Pregnant women: never saffron above food amounts.”

“Coconut, rice and the two sours. A Kerala kitchen stands on coconut: grated into the thoran, ground into the curry, squeezed into milk, pressed into oil. The coconut palm, thengu, gives food, oil, roof, rope and shade. Rice is the meal, and kanji is rice for the sick. Two souring agents make the curries: tamarind (kolpuli, valampuli) for rasam and sambar, and kudampuli (kodampuli), the dark Malabar tamarind of Garcinia, whose other name meenpuli means "fish sour", because it goes into the fish curry.”

“What it is. Rice cooked in plenty of water until soft and thin, salted, eaten warm with a little of its own water, sometimes with a spoon of moru, a piece of pickle, green gram or a little coconut. In Kerala kanji is breakfast for the farmer, supper for the tired, and the first food for anyone who has been ill. "Nobody in my house was ever sick without kanji."”

“Semolina and rice porridge. Soft, warm, a little sugar, for the weak stomach and for children.”

“START HERE: "Stop eating sugar, bread, rice, and potatoes today. Eat red meat and vegetables. Skip breakfast. Walk 30 minutes after lunch. That alone will change your body in two weeks."”

“Marty's practice: Mostly red meat, no sugars, no carbs like potatoes or rice (slow sugars that spike insulin and kill focus). Maintains nutritional ketosis as default metabolic state. Sharp focus, stable energy, no crashes, no brain fog. Combined with intermittent fasting (skip breakfast, eat lunch + dinner).”