Rice contains arsenic??? I just found out a few days ago my favourite vege, bamboo shoot, contains cyanide... and is sold pre boiled to remove it...
I seem to remember a Bruce Sterling book(Islands in the Net?) where one of the characters avoided vegetables for this reason.
Of cause they try to. It is normal evolutionary behavior of plants. And co-evolution of humans to being able to tolerate this toxins.
In fact, milk and wheat may have compounds, that are addictive.
> Market rice was purchased from major UK retailers in the city of Belfast, or purchased online through UK retailers, i.e. all products tested were widely available to the UK populace. Of the 41 samples tested in this study 2 were generically labeled as being from the EU, 11 from Spain, 6 from Italy, 5 from Thailand, 5 from France, 2 from Egypt, 1 from Japan, 1 from Australia, 1 from Lebanon, 1 from Pakistan, 1 from Turkey and 5 from the USA; with 13 being unpolished (wholegrain) and the rest polished. Descriptions of samples are given in S1 Table.