 | This article needs additional citations for verification .(March 2012) |
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| Type | Private |
|---|---|
| Genre | Natural foods; Heirloom rice; SRI Rice |
| Founded | 1995 |
| Founder | Ken Lee; Caryl Levine |
| Headquarters | , |
| Website | lotusfoods.com |
Lotus Foods is a Richmond, California, based company that focuses on importing handcrafted rice from small family farms to the United States. The company was founded in 1995 by Caryl Levine and Kenneth Lee. Their first and most popular product is a black rice called Forbidden Rice.
The company was founded in 1995 by Caryl Levine and Kenneth Lee, two years after they took a marketing research trip to China where they were served a bowl of black rice, something they never heard about before. [1] [2]
Lotus offers a variety of rice products including traditional basmati rice and jasmine rice, Black Forbidden Rice (black rice), [3] Jade Pearl Rice (short-gain rice infused with bamboo extract), [4] Bhutanese red rice, [5] Madagascar pink rice, and Volcano Rice. [6] In 2018, the company launched Rice Ramen soup cups, instant noodles made out of their rice noodles. [7]
Lotus Foods has won multiple awards for their products as well as for their involvement in SRI rice. [8] [9] In 2008 they were invited as panelists to discuss Food Security and Poverty at the Clinton Global Initiative alongside Madeleine Albright and representatives for the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. [10] [11] In 2009 they were awarded Nutrition Business Journal's Environment and Sustainability Award for their SRI related work done in conjunction with Cornell University's SRI Global Marketing Partnership. [12] In their first year as a member of the National Association of the Specialty Food Trade (NASFT) in 1998, Forbidden Rice became a Silver Finalist in the Outstanding New Product category of the annual Sofi Awards competition. To date, the company has won nine Sofi Awards. [9]
Japanese cuisine encompasses the regional and traditional foods of Japan, which have developed through centuries of political, economic, and social changes. The traditional cuisine of Japan is based on rice with miso soup and other dishes; there is an emphasis on seasonal ingredients. Side dishes often consist of fish, pickled vegetables, and vegetables cooked in broth. Seafood is common, often grilled, but also served raw as sashimi or in sushi. Seafood and vegetables are also deep-fried in a light batter, as tempura. Apart from rice, a staple includes noodles, such as soba and udon. Japan also has many simmered dishes such as fish products in broth called oden, or beef in sukiyaki and nikujaga.
Ramen is a Japanese noodle soup. It consists of Chinese-style wheat noodles served in a meat or (occasionally) fish-based broth, often flavored with soy sauce or miso, and uses toppings such as sliced pork, nori, menma, and scallions. Nearly every region in Japan has its own variation of ramen, such as the tonkotsu ramen of Kyushu, and the miso ramen of Hokkaido. Mazemen is a ramen dish that is not served in a soup, but rather with a sauce.
Chicken soup is a soup made from chicken, simmered in water, usually with various other ingredients. The classic chicken soup consists of a clear chicken broth, often with pieces of chicken or vegetables; common additions are pasta, noodles, dumplings, or grains such as rice and barley. Chicken soup has acquired the reputation of a folk remedy for colds and influenza, and in many countries is considered a comfort food.
Noodles are a type of food made from unleavened dough which is rolled flat and cut, stretched or extruded, into long strips or strings. Noodles can be refrigerated for short-term storage or dried and stored for future use.
Nissin Food Products Co., Ltd. is a Japanese food company that specializes in the production and sale of convenience food and instant noodles.
Saimin is a noodle soup dish common in the contemporary cuisine of Hawaii. Traditionally consisting of soft wheat egg noodles served in a hot dashi garnished with diced green onions and a thin slice of kamaboko, modern versions of saimin include additional toppings such as char siu, sliced Spam, sliced egg, or shredded nori. When Chinese dumplings are added to the noodle soup, it is seen on menus as the heartier wonton min. All saimin establishments have their own, often secret recipe for the soup base, but primarily use kombu and dried shrimp as major ingredients. Common table condiments mixed in the saimin broth are Chinese hot mustard and soy sauce, added in small quantities according to each individual's taste. Many local residents of Hawaii also enjoy barbecued teriyaki beef sticks (skewers) or American hamburgers as a side dish.
Cambodian cuisine is an umbrella term for the cuisines of all ethnic groups in Cambodia, whereas Khmer cuisine refers specifically to the cuisine of the Khmer people. Over the course of its more than thousand-year-long history, Khmer cuisine has incorporated elements of Indian, Chinese and more recently French cuisine, and due to some of these shared influences and mutual interaction, it has many similarities with the neighbouring Thai, Vietnamese and Lao cuisines.
Maruchan is a Japanese-American brand of instant ramen noodles, cup noodles, and Yakisoba produced by Toyo Suisan of Tokyo, Japan. The Maruchan brand is used for noodle products in Japan, and as the operating name for Toyo Suisan's division in the United States, Maruchan Inc. In 1972, Toyo Suisan entered the American market with Maruchan USA, and in 1977, established a plant in Irvine, California. Maruchan has other plants in Richmond, Virginia, and one in Bexar County, Texas. Maruchan produces over 3.6 billion packages of ramen noodle soup a year. In the United States and especially Mexico, Maruchan ramen is widely popular.
Ajinomoto Co., Inc. is a Japanese multinational food and biotechnology corporation which produces seasonings, interlayer insulating materials for semiconductor packages for use in personal computers, cooking oils, frozen foods, beverage, sweeteners, amino acids, and pharmaceuticals. Aji-No-Moto is the trade name for the company's original monosodium glutamate (MSG) product, the first of its kind, since 1909. The corporation's head office is located in Chūō, Tokyo. As of 2020, Ajinomoto operates in 36 countries and employs an estimated 34,504 people. Its yearly revenue in 2020 is around US$9.8 billion.
Sapporo Ichiban (サッポロ一番) is a brand of instant noodles manufactured by Sanyo Foods of Maebashi, Gunma, Japan. Sapporo Ichiban noodles are also manufactured in Garden Grove, California for the United States and North American market.
Japanese cuisine has a vast array of regional specialities known as kyōdo ryōri (郷土料理) in Japanese, many of them originating from dishes prepared using local ingredients and traditional recipes.
Instant soup is a type of soup designed for fast and simple preparation. Some are homemade, and some are mass-produced on an industrial scale and treated in various ways to preserve them. A wide variety of types, styles and flavors of instant soups exist. Commercial instant soups are usually dried or dehydrated, canned, or treated by freezing.
Hōtō (ほうとう) is a noodle soup and popular regional dish originating from Yamanashi, Japan made by stewing flat udon noodles and vegetables in miso soup. Though hōtō is commonly recognized as a variant of udon, locals do not consider it to be an udon dish because the dough is prepared in the style of dumplings rather than noodles.
Instant noodles, or instant ramen, are noodles sold in a precooked and dried block with flavoring powder and/or seasoning oil. The flavoring is usually in a separate packet, although in the case of cup noodles, the flavoring is often loose in the cup. Some instant noodle products are seal-packed; these can be reheated or eaten straight from the packet/container. Dried noodle blocks are designed to be cooked or soaked in boiling water before eating but can be consumed dry.
Luosifen is a Chinese noodle soup and specialty of Liuzhou, Guangxi. The dish consists of rice noodles boiled and served in a soup. The stock that forms the soup is made by stewing river snails and pork bones for several hours with black cardamom, fennel seed, dried tangerine peel, cassia bark, cloves, white pepper, bay leaf, licorice root, sand ginger, and star anise. It usually does not contain snail meat, but it is instead served with pickled bamboo shoot, pickled green beans, shredded wood ear, fu zhu, fresh green vegetables, peanuts, and chili oil added to the soup. Diners can also add chili, green onions, white vinegar, and green peppers to suit their taste.
Cup noodles are precooked instant noodles with flavoring powder and/or seasoning sauce sold in a polystyrene, polyethylene, or paper cup. The flavoring can be in a separate packet or loose in the cup. Hot water is the only ingredient that is needed separately. Cooking takes 3–5 minutes. Cup noodles have been consumed in Asia for many years. It has started to arise worldwide and it has made them a popular staple around the world.
A ramen shop is a restaurant that specializes in ramen dishes, the wheat-flour Japanese noodles in broth. In Japan, ramen shops are very common and popular, and are sometimes referred to as ramen-ya(ラーメン屋) or ramen-ten(ラーメン店). Some ramen shops operate in short order style, while others provide patrons with sit-down service. Over 10,000 ramen shops exist in Japan. In recent times, ramen shops have burgeoned in some cities in the United States, such as Chicago, Los Angeles, and New York City.
North Korea is a country in East Asia constituting the northern part of the Korean Peninsula. It is bordered to the south by South Korea, and the two countries are separated by the Korean Demilitarized Zone. Some dishes are shared by the two Koreas.