Green Glossary: Grainy Season

Across the globe, grains constitute about 50% of the world's daily caloric intake. However, in food court crazed America—where the large majority of grains grown on US soil are fed to doomed livestock—your garden variety human typically falls well short of the recommended six to eleven servings of amazing grains each day. To help remedy this situation, it helps to recognize that grains come in many varieties but can be broken down into several basic categories, as follows: Barley, buckwheat, millet, oats, quinoa (pronounced keen-wah), rye, triticale, and wheat. Of course, as you read this, roughly half of the world's population is being fed thanks to a single amazing grain: rice. In other words, it's always grainy season for those seeking a healthy, earth-friendly, plant-based diet.

FYI: Amaranth—praised as a "supergrain" by the Aztecs—is not really a grain at all. It's related to a common weed called pigweed and is in the same family as the infamous tumbleweeds of the American Southwest. But that sure doesn't mean you shouldn't be simmering it like rice, popping it like popcorn, or sprouting it to be eaten as a live food.