The "Black Gold" of Grains: Black Rice Intake Sharpens Memory and Dampens Inflammation in Seniors

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#21

I never got into frozen fruit, probably since I didn’t grow up with them. Blueberries in particular are quite bland to me. I did grow up with rice, so I’ve had black rice before. Looking forward to consume more.

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#22

I’ve been eating Whole Foods’ Forbidden Rice for years, but I never knew that it’s such a nutritional powerhouse. It comes in 8 oz, microwavable bags and the 90-seconds cooking time is a large part of its appeal. What’s more, in contrast to Minute Rice, the nutrients haven’t been leached out in the preparation process. I’m on a low-sodium diet and this type of fast-cook rice, like the jasmine and basmati varieties, has zero sodium. The Whole Foods bakery makes a Forbidden Rice sourdough bread, which sounds pretty good, but it does have sodium.

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#23

Some propaganda about wild blueberries by industry group:

New review finds wild blueberries support heart and gut health

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#24

Updated on sourcing black rice (I’m just buying some)…

Procurement Findings: Cempo Ireng & Toraja Black Rice (USA)

Bottom line up front: I could not assemble a Top 10 — or even a Top 1 — table of verifiable, in-stock, US-shipping retail listings for black rice sold under the Cempo Ireng or Toraja varietal names. Per your own verification constraint (“if a direct link cannot be verified, omit the item”), nearly every candidate has to be omitted. I’d rather tell you that plainly than hand you a table of fabricated SKUs, prices, and links, which is the one thing a procurement search must never do.

New search:

Here’s the practical procurement picture, split into the two questions you’re really asking: (1) which black rice is actually anthocyanin-rich and how to tell, and (2) where to buy it cheapest in the US.

Part 1 — Identifying anthocyanin-rich black rice (the evidence)

The anthocyanin lives almost entirely in the unpolished bran layer, so the practical buying rule is: whole-grain (unmilled) + deep black/purple pigment = high anthocyanin. The bran hull of black rice contains one of the highest levels of anthocyanin pigment found in food, and its dark purple color is primarily due to anthocyanin, higher by weight than other colored grains. Any product that’s been polished or is a “quick-cook” refined version will have lost most of it. Wikipedia

What the measurement literature shows about specific types (best available sources are peer-reviewed total-anthocyanin-content studies, which vary a lot by cultivar and assay method):

  • Generic black rice (typical): one study cited by dietitians put it at 456 mg of anthocyanin per 100 g of rice. Across 18 Indonesian cultivars, content ranged widely — from about 53 to 428 mg per 100 g depending on genetics. Yahoo!ResearchGate
  • Indonesian landraces (Cempo Ireng, Toraja): consistently among the highest measured. In one cultivar comparison, Toraja black rice tested highest of 10 cultivars, followed by Banjarnegara and Melik. These are the varieties you originally asked about — strong on anthocyanin, but as established earlier, not sold as US retail SKUs. IOPscience
  • Thai Riceberry / black jasmine (Hom Nin): a purple whole-grain cross that is well-documented as anthocyanin-rich and, unlike the Indonesian landraces, is actually buyable in the US. Riceberry is a cultivar created by hybridizing Hom Nil (black jasmine rice) with a jasmine rice, long-grain, reddish-black raw and purplish-black cooked. Pigmented Thai varieties including purple Riceberry are noted as a polyphenol source. AmazonScienceDirect
  • Other documented high-anthocyanin types: Philippine heirloom balatinaw and pirurutong black glutinous rice, Thai jasmine black rice, and Indian chak-hao (Manipur) and kavuni (Tamil Nadu). Wikipedia

One important procurement trap: “black wild rice” (Minnesota wild rice) is NOT the same thing and is not a good anthocyanin pick — it is the seed of the aquatic grass Zizania aquatica, native to the Great Lakes region, not Oryza sativa rice. Skip it if anthocyanin is your goal. Amazon

Part 2 — Most cost-effective US sources

I split this into prices I directly verified on the live page today versus listings to confirm at checkout, because for a cost ranking that distinction matters.

Verified in-stock pricing (page checked today):

Rank Product (exact title) Vendor Weight (unit / grams) Price (USD) Cost per 100 g (price ÷ grams × 100) Link
1 InHarvest Black Rice, 25 Pound Bag FoodServiceDirect 25 lb / 11,340 g $86.95 86.95 ÷ 11,340 × 100 = $0.77 Inharvest Black Rice | FoodServiceDirect
2 Black Rice 5 lb. (case of 10) WebstaurantStore 50 lb / 22,680 g $188.99 ($18.90/bag) 18.90 ÷ 2,268 × 100 = $0.83 https://www.webstaurantstore.com/black-rice-5-lb-case/11200098.html
3 Black Rice 5 lb. (single) WebstaurantStore 5 lb / 2,268 g $21.49 21.49 ÷ 2,268 × 100 = $0.95 https://www.webstaurantstore.com/black-rice-5-lb/99900098.html

The InHarvest 25 lb bag is marked “Stocked, ready to ship within 1 day.” The WebstaurantStore item usually ships in 1 business day but cannot ship to California — relevant to you in San Francisco, so treat #2 and #3 as out of reach unless you ship to another state. Food Service DirectWeb Restaurant Store

Candidates to verify (real listings, anthocyanin-documented types, but confirm current price/stock on the page):

The core tradeoff

The cheapest options per 100 g (the bulk InHarvest / WebstaurantStore bags at ~$0.77–0.95) are generic black rice with no disclosed cultivar or anthocyanin assay — so you’re buying on the “dark whole grain” heuristic, not a measured number. The named, anthocyanin-documented types (Riceberry, and the Indonesian landraces you started with) cost more but come with published content data. If maximizing verified anthocyanin per dollar is the goal, mid-priced organic Riceberry is the sweet spot; if maximizing raw black-rice mass per dollar, the 25 lb InHarvest bag wins.

Shipping notes

FoodServiceDirect: free shipping over a threshold, otherwise UPS Ground, 1–4 business days. WebstaurantStore: ships in ~1 business day but no California delivery on that item. Amazon Riceberry listings are frequently Prime/free-shipping eligible — confirm per listing.

#25

Follow-on prompt:

Given the research you can identify, Which of these two options are likely to have the higher anthocyanin levels. Jasberry - Organic Superfood Rice, Soft & Aromatic Whole Grain Purple Rice or Lotus Foods Bulk Organic Forbidden Rice - Black, Gluten Free Heirloom, Whole Grain, Non-GMO, Vegan - 11 lb Bag

Claude Opus 4.8 response:

Short answer: the Jasberry 11 lb bag is the more likely of the two to be higher in anthocyanin — but the case is suggestive, not conclusive, and the headline numbers overstate it. Here’s the reasoning, including why I’d hedge.

Why Jasberry probably edges it. Jasberry is a Thai purple rice bred specifically over a decade of cross-breeding to maximize antioxidant content, and the bag you linked is the pure product — “a dark purple, 100% whole grain rice,” single ingredient: organic whole grain jasberry superfood rice, product of Thailand. Erewhon confirms its single-ingredient and bran-intact. The vendor’s own lab testing puts it at an ORAC value of 13,370 µmol TE per 100g, which they say is 6 times more antioxidants than black (forbidden) rice. Lotus Foods Forbidden Rice is a genuine, deeply pigmented Chinese heirloom black rice, but the brand publishes no comparable anthocyanin or ORAC figure. On a like-for-like, dark-pigment, whole-grain basis, the purpose-bred high-pigment variety is the better bet. Supermarket Italy + 2

Why I won’t state it as a sure thing. Three honest caveats:

  1. ORAC is not anthocyanin. Jasberry’s “6x” number measures total antioxidant capacity, not anthocyanin content. In black rice, anthocyanin pigments contribute only about 0.5–2.5% of total antioxidant capacity — the capacity comes mainly from other phenolic compounds. So a 6x ORAC edge does not translate to a 6x anthocyanin edge; the gap on anthocyanin specifically is likely much smaller and isn’t directly measured here. ScienceDirect
  2. Forbidden rice can itself test very high. Black rice cultivars span a wide anthocyanin range — one study measured 79.5 to 473.7 mg per 100 g across black rice cultivars, and total anthocyanin across black rice has been reported anywhere from roughly 27 to over 5,000 µg/g. A good lot of Lotus Foods forbidden rice could plausibly match or beat an average Jasberry lot on anthocyanin alone. ScienceDirectnih
  3. The strongest Jasberry data is vendor-commissioned, not an independent head-to-head against Lotus Foods specifically.

The one thing that would flip it — buy the right bag. Jasberry sells two products. The purple single-ingredient bag (what you linked) is pure. The separate “Jasberry Rice Mix” (orange) is an equal blend of organic Jasberry rice and organic brown jasmine rice. Brown jasmine is non-pigmented, so the mix has roughly half the anthocyanin per 100 g — and a pure Lotus Foods forbidden rice would likely beat that. Your link is the pure version, so you’re fine; just don’t accidentally order the orange mix. Jasberry

Bottom line: Jasberry (pure purple bag) is the higher-anthocyanin pick of the two with maybe ~65–70% confidence — driven by it being a purpose-bred, deeply pigmented, single-ingredient whole grain — but treat the “6x” framing as a total-antioxidant marketing figure rather than an anthocyanin measurement. The only way to settle it definitively would be a lab anthocyanin assay on each specific lot, which neither brand provides.