The Boston Globe - September 21st, 2005
     

An heirloom rice returns
 By Siddhartha Mitter, Globe Correspondent

CHARLESTON, S.C. -- In the Colonial era, this elegant seaport was the richest city in the New World, thanks to an exquisite variety of rice known as Carolina Gold that blanketed the lowlands of the coastal era. The hallowed grains are on the rise again.

The rice's return makes it possible to render the sophisticated Creole cooking of the Lowcountry to traditional standards. At one time, slaves tended the rice under harsh conditions. But after the Civil War the plantations emptied, Charleston declined, and Carolina Gold faced oblivion. Carolina Gold seeds were preserved in several land-grant universities; growers planted it in the mid-1990s to see if they could revive it.

Carolina Gold rice is delicate, with a nutty tone and a lush feel on the palate. Its grains are full and absorbent enough for risotto yet long enough to fluff and separate -- a sweet spot on the rice spectrum. Carolina Gold complements Afro-Atlantic staples like smoked meats, shrimp and okra, and dishes that are slow-cooked in a single pot -- gumbo, for instance -- to produce a rich melding of subtle flavors.

Most American-grown rice is starchy, heavily processed, and doesn't have a lot of flavor. Grown and milled using techniques with roots in Africa, Carolina Gold straddles the line between long and medium. The grains are flecked with ample residual bran from the milling process. As a result, they look like Uncle Ben's feral cousin -- which in a sense they are.

"Carolina Gold became Uncle Ben's in effect," says Glenn Roberts, owner of Anson Mills in Columbia, SC, and president of the Carolina Gold Rice Foundation. "They took the germ out, they milled it to death, they sprayed vitamins on it. It's like instant grits. How much flavor do you have there?"

The origins of this versatile grain are fodder for debate. Genetic analysis shows Carolina Gold has numerous commonalities with West African as well as Asian varieties, suggesting a cross-bred variety that evolved over time. ''There were an infinite number of rice varieties grown here, starting with African rice," says Roberts, who believes Carolina Gold results from decades of experimentation.
 


Carolina Gold Rice
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West African slaves with rice-growing skills fetched a premium at Charleston auctions. Their mortar-and-pestle pounding -- ''the hardest work there is," says Roberts -- preserved the rice germ and some of the bran, enhancing both flavor and nutritional value.

Roberts got engineers to develop an industrial mill that emulates the African technique, to avoid stressing the grains with high heat. The added costs, and the short shelf life that comes from retaining the germ, make Roberts's rice for the foreseeable future a niche item.

''It brings flavor and it brings texture," says chef Louis Osteen of Louis's at Pawley's, one of many Charleston chefs who work with Carolina Gold. ''I'm optimistic because it's good stuff, number one; and it's local stuff for us. Uncle Ben's doesn't have to worry too much, but [Carolina Gold] is a viable economic operation."

Yet like many heirloom foods, Carolina Gold suffers from the paradox of being a once-widespread and popular item now dependent on an upscale market. Its fate is tied to that of other heirlooms and to the continued interest in traditional American, and especially African-American and Creole, foodways.

Still, prospects for Carolina Gold are the best they've been in a century. ''We cannot allow this rice to become extinct," Roberts says, ''because it conveys an authentic, tactile sense of the historic slave and master dynamic that inspired America's first truly Creole cuisine."
 
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