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Rice: White Or Brown?
Rice: White Or Brown?
27 Sep 2021
Disclaimer
Brown rice is a whole grain with all three parts: bran, germ and endosperm. See What Are Whole Grains? White rice is a refined grain with only endosperm. Are whole grains nutritionally superior? Yes. See Why Are Whole Grains Better Than Refined Grains?

Below are articles and videos that focus specifically on rice: brown rice (a whole grain) vs white rice (a refined grain).

Articles by Dr Greger:

Videos by Dr Greger:

(2016) Is It Worth Switching from White Rice to Brown?

(4 mins) Transcript. Dr Greger's summary: "What happens when brown rice is put to the test in a randomized controlled crossover trial?"

(2010) Brown Rice vs Black Rice

(1 min) Transcript. Dr Greger's summary: "Which has more antioxidants: black rice, brown rice, or red rice?"

(2015) If White Rice Is Linked to Diabetes, What About China?

(5 mins) Transcript. Dr Greger's summary: "Protein consumption can exacerbate the insulin spike from high glycemic foods."

Nutrition Loss

Refined grains like white rice have only the endosperm. Whole grains have all three parts: bran, germ and endosperm. The diagram below shows that we lost the vast majority of micronutrients like vitamins and minerals by removing bran and germ. We also lose a lot of fiber.

Source: This video by Dr Greger (2012).

How many micronutrients are lost in brown rice with bran and germ removal? Whole Grains Council has a diagram:

Source: Article at WholeGrainsCouncil.org

Arsenic In Rice

Rice is not recommended by multiple Whole Food Plant-Based doctors like Dr Greger, Dr Klaper and Dr fuhrman. Why? Because rice has too much arsenic these days! Even if we adopt the best known arsenic reduction technique (boiling in excess water, then draining), cancer risk from arsenic in rice remains too high.

Dr Peter Rogers
(10 mins, 2022) Is White Rice Healthy?
Should We Diversify Beyond Brown Rice?

An excerpt from Whole Grains May Work as Well as Drugs (2012):

An interesting wrinkle is that they found other whole grains may be even better than brown rice. Eating white rice was associated with a 17% greater risk of diabetes; replace it with brown, and instead, apparently get a 16% drop in risk. And, replace white rice with other whole grains, such as oats and barley? A 36% lower diabetes risk. Just a single serving a day of oats or barley may lower our cholesterol.

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