Grain to Glass

For one Arkansas rice grower, passion leads to good spirits

- ERICA SWEENEY

Chris Isbell loves experimenting on his rice farm in England, Arkansas. That curiosity has made Isbell Farms one of the most essential producers of sake rice in the US.

"I like different things," Isbell says. "I'm passionately curious, and this satisfies that curiosity. Sometimes you're successful, and sometimes you're not. But we were successful."

The desire to do things a little differently started with Isbell's dad, Leroy. The farm has been around since the 1800s, but Leroy planted the first rice crop in the late 1940s. In the early 1990s, the farm started growing a type of sushi rice called Koshihikari, which many thought couldn't be produced outside of Japan, Isbell says. The move garnered a lot of buzz from Japanese media.

Isbell then planted an "experimental plot" to try growing dozens of other Japanese rice varieties and found success with sake rice. They sold some of their first sake rice to Takara Sake USA.

Today, Isbell Farms produces four types of sake rice: Yamada Nishiki, Omachi, Wataribune, and Gohakumangoku. It now comprises about 10 percent of the farm's 3,500 acres.