Insalata di riso is a quintessential Italian summer dish, a versatile meal that can be customized with a myriad of ingredients. Tracing its exact origins can be challenging, however, its roots likely extend to ancient China, where rice had long been a dietary staple, often consumed cold with vegetables, fish, and meat. 

One of the earliest recorded Italian rice salad recipes appears in a 16th-century culinary treatise by an anonymous chef, possibly from Padua. This recipe described a cold rice dish cooked in broth and milk, a common practice for cereal preparation at the time.