Food Sources: Earth, Water, and Air - Food Culture and Health in Pre-Modern Islamic Societies - page 27

times and references to its cultivation in
al-Andalus from the 4th/10th century are
numerous.
The 6th/12th century Andalusī author
Ibn al-Awwām, who cites, among others,
his eastern predecessor Ibn Washiyya,
relates various methods of planting rice.
These included the familiar (and recom-
mended) submerging of the seedlings in
water to drown their weed competitors;
however, they were also planted in drier
or drained areas which required careful
weeding. Transplanting seedlings to the
paddy field after they had swollen was the
preferred technique, but non-transplant-
ing was apparently also practiced. Milling
techniques were basic; the plants were
dried after harvesting and then placed
in sacks and beaten with metal rods to
remove the kernels. After winnowing, the
kernels were placed in another bag and
beaten to remove the husk. After a second
winnowing, the milled, unpolished, white
grains were stored in earthenware jars.
There is no mention of subsequent pol-
ishing of the grains or of using the ancient
Indian technique of parboiling the plant
to preserve more of its nutrients, such as
vitamin B1. Two crops a year were har-
vested, the summer crop being said to be
better than the winter one.
Out of all the cereals known in the
mediaeval Islamic world, rice did not
seem to enjoy the wide-spread popular-
ity that wheat, sorghum and barley did.
Nevertheless, in areas where it was heav-
ily cultivated, such as the southern parts
of the Sawād of Irā and ‡ ūzistān,
rice bread was the staple of the poor and
al- ⁄ āi reports that it was the favoured
fare of misers, who offered it to their
guests. The rice bread baker was called
¶ ubz aruzzī (the nisba of the popular poet
of Bara Abu 'l-āsim Nar al- ‡ ubza
aruzzī. The physician al-Rāzī (d. 320/932)
observed that rice bread was less digest-

ible than wheat bread, hence it should be
eaten with salty food or with a lot of fat
or with milk or garlic in order to prevent
ill side effects. In this connection, Canard
has remarked upon references to the con-
sumption of rice and rice bread with fish
in Irā. Ibn Zuhr (d. 557/1162) adds that
rice bread produces thick humour, causes
obstructions in the intestines and has an
astringent effect upon the stomach.
The general medical view of rice itself
was that it inclined towards the “cold” ele-
ment by nature which, it was said, could
be modified when cooked with milk or fat
and eaten with sugar. When cooked with
milk, oxymel was recommended to be
drunk afterwards to counter obstructions
in the stomach caused by it.
Food preparation with rice was not,
however, confined only to bread among
the lowest classes. The mediaeval Arabic
culinary manuals, which reflect the urban
ambience of a leisured class, contain reci-
pes where rice is employed in a number
of ways. The following is a representa-
tive selection taken from an anonymous
work of probable Egyptian provenance of
the 7/13 or 8/14 century. These include
rice as an alternative to cornstarch as a
thickening agent in stews made with meat
and vegetables, where the rice is added in
the last stage of preparation. In another
receipt, washed rice cooked in fresh milk
and seasoned with mastic, camphor and
cinnamon appears to be close to the mod-
ern popular rice pudding dish, muallabiya .
The mediaeval version of muallabiyya , by
contrast, was made with meat or chicken,
sweetened with honey and seasoned with
spices to which saffron-coloured rice is
added. Indeed, the most common way of
using rice in a substantial dish was to cook
meat and/or vegetables with it in the
same pot. One variation called al-labani-
yya containing meat and leeks or onion is
cooked in milk ( laban ) together with a little