Tuesday, April 28, 2009

Rice Paper - Not from Rice


"Rice paper isn't made from rice but from a small tree which grows in Taiwan."

In Europe, around the 1900s, a paperlike substance was originally known as rice paper, due to the mistaken notion that it is made from rice. In fact, it consists of the pith of a small tree, Tetrapanax papyrifer, the rice paper plant. 
The plant grows in the swampy forests of Taiwan, and is also cultivated as ornamental plant.[citation needed] In order to produce the paper, the boughs are boiled and freed from bark. 
The cylindrical core of pith is rolled on a hard flat surface against a knife, by which it is cut into thin sheets of a fine ivory-like texture.

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