Contaminated rice
“Ökotest” causes two providers to stop selling their products
Can you reheat rice?
Do you have leftover rice from the day before and want to reheat it? Is it even allowed to do this, or is it harmful to your health?
Yes, but only under these conditions:
The rice must be completely cooled and packed in an airtight container.
The rice should not be left in the refrigerator for longer than 24 hours.
Before eating: Heat the rice thoroughly until it steams.
Otherwise, bacteria could form that are toxic.
The following applies: You can heat it once, but not a second time.
This rice test makes sense: the pollutant levels in two products are so high that the suppliers stop selling them. “Ökotest” gives two other types of rice the worst grade. The good news: Many products are free of harmful substances.
Even a small grain of rice makes a mess: In the brown rice from Norma (Bio-Sonne), the testers from “Eco test” Arsenic, mineral oil and spray poison in such high quantities that it would have been enough for the overall rating “unsatisfactory” twice. The Federal Institute for Risk Assessment (BfR) even rated the analysis as posing such an acute health risk that Norma immediately removed the product from its range . There are a total of 21 rice brands in the rice test: seven times each of brown rice, risotto and basmati. Eleven products have an organic seal. The testers paid between 1.09 euros and 4.79 euros for a pound of rice.
Another black sheep in the test is the “Natural Long Grain Top Rice” from Rapunzel. The laboratory commissioned by “Ökotest” measured a cadmium content that more than doubled the EU limit. “That’s crazy,” writes “Ökotest”. “Cadmium is a toxic heavy metal that accumulates in the body and, when consumed in high doses over a long period of time, can lead to kidney and bone damage.”
Rice: Norma and Rapunzel take their products off the market
Rapunzel took the results very seriously and also commissioned a laboratory that confirmed the analyzes from “Ökotest”. In this case too, the manufacturer immediately stopped sales and took back the affected rice. Overall, only two out of seven nature trips manage to stay below the limits for cadmium and arsenic.
One of the leading conventional rice brands, Oryza, also attracts negative attention. The Oryza Risotto Rice uses more than half of the new arsenic limit for milled white rice. This product also received an overall rating of “unsatisfactory”. So: Which rice can you still consume?
The good news: The many harmful substances are only found in a few products, others are perfect and also taste good. For example, the “K-Bio Long Grain Natural Rice” from Kaufland (1.25 per 500 grams), the “Golden Sun Organic Basmati Rice” from Lidl (1.79 euros) or Denree Risotto Rice (2.29 euros) from the health food store.