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Product type | Flavored rice, pasta mixes |
---|---|
Owner | Quaker Oats Company |
Country | United States |
Introduced | 1958 |
Markets | U.S. |
Previous owners | Golden Grain Macaroni Company |
Tagline | "The San Francisco Treat" |
Website | ricearoni.com |
Rice-A-Roni is a boxed food mix that consists of rice, vermicelli pasta, and seasonings. It is based on the Levantine pilaf dish rizz bi-sha'riyya. [1] [2] To prepare, the rice and pasta are browned in butter, then water and seasonings are added and simmered until absorbed. It is a product of Quaker Oats Company, a subsidiary of PepsiCo.
In 1890, Italian-born immigrant Domenico DeDomenico [3] moved to California, where he established a fresh produce store. A successful businessman, he married Maria Ferrigno from Salerno, Italy. Back home, her family owned a pasta factory, so in 1912 she persuaded him to establish a similar business in the Mission District of San Francisco. The enterprise was "Gragnano Products, Inc." It delivered pasta to Italian stores and restaurants in the area.
DeDomenico's sons, Paskey, Vince (1915–2007), Tom, and Anthony, worked with him. In 1934, Paskey changed the name to "Golden Grain Macaroni Company". Tom's wife, Lois, was inspired by the pilaf recipe she received from Armenian immigrant Pailadzo Captanian, to create a dish of rice and macaroni, which she served at a family dinner. In 1958, Vince invented Rice-A-Roni by adding a dry chicken soup mix to rice and macaroni. It was introduced in 1958 in the Northwestern United States and went nationwide four years later. Because of its origins, it was called "The San Francisco Treat!" [4]
After a trip to Italy in 1964, Vince returned with the idea for "Noodle Roni Parmesano", based on the classic Noodles Alfredo. As the product line extended with other shapes and sauces it was renamed from Noodle Roni to Pasta Roni in 1995. In 1986, Quaker Oats Company purchased the Golden Grain Company from the DeDomenico family. [5] In 2001, the Quaker Oats Company was purchased by PepsiCo.
American Italian Pasta Company bought the Golden Grain brand in 2003, but the sale did not include Rice-a-Roni, which remained with the Quaker Oats division of PepsiCo. [6]
Rice-a-Roni is marketing low-sodium versions of its primary products. The company has marketed a line of products with brown rice.
Macaroni is dry pasta shaped like narrow tubes. Made with durum wheat, macaroni is commonly cut in short lengths; curved macaroni may be referred to as elbow macaroni. Some home machines can make macaroni shapes but, like most pasta, macaroni is usually made commercially by large-scale extrusion. The curved shape is created by different speeds of extrusion on opposite sides of the pasta tube as it comes out of the machine.
Pasta is a type of food typically made from an unleavened dough of wheat flour mixed with water or eggs, and formed into sheets or other shapes, then cooked by boiling or baking. Rice flour, or legumes such as beans or lentils, are sometimes used in place of wheat flour to yield a different taste and texture, or as a gluten-free alternative. Pasta is a staple food of Italian cuisine.
Spaghetti is a long, thin, solid, cylindrical pasta. It is a staple food of traditional Italian cuisine. Like other pasta, spaghetti is made of milled wheat, water, and sometimes enriched with vitamins and minerals. Italian spaghetti is typically made from durum-wheat semolina. Usually the pasta is white because refined flour is used, but whole wheat flour may be added. Spaghettoni is a thicker form of spaghetti, while spaghettini is a thinner form. Capellini is a very thin spaghetti, sometimes known colloquially as "angel hair pasta", while Vermicelli refers to intermediate widths, varying between the United States and Italy.
Breakfast cereal is a breakfast food made from processed cereal grains. It is traditionally eaten as part of breakfast, or a snack food, primarily in Western societies.
Kraft Dinner (KD) in Canada, Kraft Mac & Cheese in the United States, Australia, and New Zealand, Cheesey Pasta in the United Kingdom and internationally is a nonperishable, packaged macaroni and cheese product. It is made by Kraft Foods Group and traditionally cardboard-boxed with dried macaroni pasta and a packet of processed cheese powder. It was introduced under the Kraft Dinner name simultaneously in both Canada and the U.S. in 1937. The brand is particularly popular with Canadians, who consume 55% more boxes per capita than Americans.
Vermicelli is a traditional type of pasta round in section similar to spaghetti. In English-speaking regions it is usually thinner than spaghetti, while in Italy it is typically thicker.
Macaroni and cheese is a dish of cooked macaroni pasta and a cheese sauce, most commonly cheddar sauce.
The Ghirardelli Chocolate Company is an American confectioner, wholly owned by Swiss confectioner Lindt & Sprüngli. The company was founded by and is named after Italian chocolatier Domenico Ghirardelli, who, after working in South America, moved to California. The Ghirardelli Chocolate Company was incorporated in 1852, and is the third-oldest chocolate company in the US, after Baker's Chocolate and Whitman's.
Pilaf or pilau is a rice dish, or in some regions, a wheat dish, whose recipe usually involves cooking in stock or broth, adding spices, and other ingredients such as vegetables or meat, and employing some technique for achieving cooked grains that do not adhere to each other.
Orzo, also known as risoni, is a form of short-cut pasta, shaped like a large grain of rice. Orzo is traditionally made from flour, but it can also be made of whole grain. It is often made with semolina, a type of flour made from durum wheat.
Rice vermicelli is a thin form of noodle. It is sometimes referred to as 'rice noodles' or 'rice sticks', but should not be confused with cellophane noodles, a different Asian type of vermicelli made from mung bean starch or rice starch rather than rice grains themselves.
Sevai, shavige, saemia and santhakai is a type of rice vermicelli popular in India. While typically made from rice, varieties made out of other food grains like wheat, ragi, and others can also be found.
Vincent Michael "Vince" DeDomenico, Sr. was an American entrepreneur, one of the inventors of Rice-A-Roni, and a founder of the Napa Valley Wine Train.
Ebro Foods, S.A., formerly Ebro Puleva, is a Spanish food processing company. Ebro Foods is the world's largest producer of rice and the second biggest producer of pasta. The company's head office is in Madrid.
Pailadzo Captanian, was a survivor of the Armenian genocide and an author. She is also credited with inspiring the creation of Rice-A-Roni which is based on her own recipe of Armenian pilaf.
The Quaker Oats Company, known as Quaker, is an American food conglomerate based in Chicago, Illinois. As Quaker Mill Company, the company was founded in 1877 in Ravenna, Ohio. In 1881, Henry Crowell bought the company and launched a national advertising campaign for Quaker Oats.
Sopa de fideo, also referred to as sopita de fideo, is a stock-based noodle soup that is a part of the cuisines of Spain, Mexico, and Cavite, a province in the Philippines. It has been suggested that the dish may have originated in Spain.
Arabic rice or rice with vermicelli is a traditional preparation of rice in the Middle East, a variant of the simpler cooked rice recipe, but adding lightly toasted vermicelli. The rice cooking method is known as pilaf, by which the rice is fluffy, light and does not stick. Traditionally, a long-grain rice, such as basmati or jasmine, is used, although short-grain rice, such as bomba or misri ("Egyptian"), can be used perfectly. Brown rice can also be used.