Uncle Ben's
This article is about the brand of rice and other foods. For the Spider-Man comic book character, see Uncle Ben.Uncle Ben's is a brand name for
parboiled ("converted")
rice and related food products. It is owned by
Mars, Inc.; in the U.S., by its subsidiary Masterfoods. The brand was first used by a company called Converted Rice, Inc., which was later bought by Mars.
Uncle Ben's rice was the top-selling rice in the
United States from
1950 until the
1990s.[
1]
According to Mars, Uncle Ben was an
African-American rice-grower in
Texas known for the quality of his rice[
2]; Mars does not supply any further biographical detail about this person. The rice packages carry an image of an elderly
African-American man dressed in a bow-tie, perhaps a steward in the
Uncle Tom tradition[
3] or perhaps a Chicago maitre d'hotel, Frank Brown.[
4]
*
Betty Crocker*
Aunt Jemima*
Quaker Oats*
Official Web site of Uncle Ben's brand
