Naturally Delicious: New organic rice brand advances environmental message

Nichi Bei News

April 24, 2025

About 30 years ago, Wendy Tsuji had an epiphany. It came after she read news coverage about farm workers suffering health problems from pesticides in strawberry fields. Appalled by this injustice, she resolved to limit the ecological impact of her eating habits. She became a firm devotee of organic food, a commitment that represented “a real turning point,” she testified.

In addition to shaping her personal dietary choices for the past three decades, this commitment has driven her more recent trailblazing enterprise — the launch of her own brand of organic rice.

Despite no previous agricultural experience, Tsuji felt compelled to jump into the California rice trade upon learning that the state grows only a tiny fraction of it organically. “I was so surprised,” she recounted, thinking to herself at the time, “Why is there not more organic rice? It’s such a good idea.”

She put the idea into practice with a premium short-grain variety that she calls Luna Koshihikari. In 2022, she coordinated her first harvest in the Sacramento Valley, and quickly earned a stellar reputation among discerning tastemakers. Featured at some of the most esteemed Japanese restaurants around — such as Ramen Shop in Oakland, SingleThread in Healdsburg, and Nisei in San Francisco — her rice has also landed on the shelves at some of the Nikkei community’s favorite Bay Area markets, including Tokyo Fish Market, Berkeley Bowl West, and Umami Mart.

Achieving this kind of prominence represents a significant accomplishment, but for Tsuji, the popularity of her product fulfills the more pressing mission of promoting her environmental message.

“I’m not just interested in making rice for Michelin restaurants,” she said, referring to the level of prestige attained by a few of the establishments that use Luna Koshihikari. The real benefit of supplying to famous kitchens comes from the fact that “a lot of the Michelin restaurants are food leaders in terms of getting sustainable product into the hands of people who need it.” Eventually, Tsuji hopes the zeal for her rice in the fine-dining world will cascade out to less affluent spaces like schools, hospitals, and food hubs (a USDA designation for regional distribution facilities).

To help catalyze this wider adoption of her rice and the green ideology behind it, she gives “mini-lectures” to restaurant staff about how the production of Luna Koshihikari supports ecosystem health. She wants them to convey these details to restaurant guests, who may hold influence in other sectors, given that high-end eateries tend to attract power brokers. “Every one of these guests is successful in what they do, and they have a lot of clout, and are thirsty for this information,” Tsuji said. Her goal is for them to carry the information out into places where it may foment social and environmental change.

This strategy hinges on the revelatory potential of eating food crafted with quality ingredients and served in a rarified atmosphere. “I think a meal on that level is about much more than personal enjoyment,” Tsuji asserted. “You come away from a meal like that enthusiastic or excited because you’ve learned about a new thing. It enriches your whole experience. And that’s part of what my rice is about,” she explained.

“It’s not just another product,” she said, elaborating that “it has a story behind it — and a purpose.”

That story starts with Tsuji, who grew up on Oahu munching musubi at the beach, making tsukemono with her baachan, and learning the value of a healthy diet from her mother. She stuck around Hawaii through the end of college, studying fine arts at UH Manoa, then moved to the mainland, where she earned a graduate degree in architecture from UC Berkeley.

In the early 1980s, she co-founded her own firm, Frost-Tsuji Architects, setting up shop in San Francisco. The business thrived, providing her with opportunities to design restaurant interiors, which she built with eco-friendly techniques (such as relying on salvaged materials and low-VOC paints). Roaming in culinary circles, she absorbed insights about foodways, honing her cooking skills with Sylvan Mishima Brackett (who would go on to start the upscale San Francisco izakaya Rintaro) and frequently visiting Japan to glean inspiration for planning dining spaces (covering everything from furniture selection to condiment manufacturing).

After decades steeped in this gastronomic milieu, in 2021 Tsuji prepared to expand her professional repertoire out into the agricultural realm. In a process she described as “falling down a rabbit hole,” she began to conduct exhaustive research on rice, spending countless hours on the Internet, running tons of taste tests, and conferring with staff members at the California Rice Experiment Station up in Butte County.

Prioritizing organic methods added a layer of difficulty to her undertaking. She learned that the easiest types of rice to produce organically are basmati and jasmine, both long-grain indicas, but she wanted to work with a short-grain japonica. Ultimately, her rigorous deliberations led her to embrace koshihikari, a cultivar developed in early postwar Japan. It now dominates the market in that country, but proves particularly challenging to harvest due to its tall, thin stalk and heavy head. Tsuji reported that she met people who had tried their hand at koshihikari but decided it was not worth the trouble.

Nonetheless, she found a farmer who was willing to grow it for her, and to do so organically. She arranged to have it processed by Far West Rice, a small, conscientious mill with operations powered by 85 percent solar energy. The company avoids using heat to dry harvests, thereby preserving the koshihikari’s sweet flavor and milky color (a shade evoking the moon, leading to the name Luna). And with both of her partners in such close proximity, the transporting of her rice leaves a minimal carbon footprint, in contrast to the greenhouse gas emissions associated with importing a comparable product from Japan, more than 5,000 miles away.

For all the environmental upside of Tsuji’s endeavor, she doesn’t harbor illusions that she’s somehow saving the world. “I’m not going to solve climate change,” she conceded. However, she does have faith that her efforts can make a difference, motivating individuals to make more sustainable choices. As she insisted, “I think everybody has to do their part” — including adjusting their own diets for the sake of the planet.

“Eating really should be food activism,” Tsuji declared, adding, “you should eat what you believe in.”