Grain amaranths (Amaranthus spp.)
AMARANTHACEAE, Amaranth Family
Quinua (Chenopodium quinoa)
CHENOPODIACEAE, Goosefoot Family
Buckwheat (Fagopyrum esculentum)
POLYGONACEAE, Smartweed Family
Other species of Polygonaceae were occasionally used by Indian tribes in the New World; however, the principal pseudograin of the Americas were species of Amaranthus of the pigweed family (Family Amaranthaceae) and Chenopodium of the goosefoot family (Family Chenopodiaceae). These plants have dry fruits that by various authors are called nutlets, achenes, or grains.
Three species of Amaranthus, two in Mexico and Central America (A. cruentus and A. hypochondriacus) and one in westernmost South America (A. caudatus), were successfully cultivated in pre-Columbian times. Amaranths may have begun their association with humans as plants that were used in religion and then secondarily became cultivated for food. Plants with red leaves and showy, colorful inflorescences were planted in primitive grainfields to scare away devils. Likewise, amaranth fruits were mixed with human blood in pagan rituals and formed into god-like statues, which were eaten after the religious ceremony.
Much interest has been generated recently for quinua (or quinoa), Chenopodium quinoa, which was and still is cultivated intensively between 2000 and 4000 meters in the Andes (Ecuador, Peru, and Bolivia), where maize cultivation is marginal or nonproductive because the climate is cold and harsh. In the highlands, quinua is an important protein source (15% by weight) and shares the daily menu with Irish potato and other native root crops. The earthy-tasting fruits are washed well to leach out bitter properties, and then used in stews, soups, porridge, and, occasionally, to make alcoholic chicha. Leaves are eaten as potherbs, and old stems are burned to make ash that is made into a paste to chew with coca leaves (Erythroxylum coca), the original crack cocaine. Alkaline substances help to release cocaine from the leaves. Chenopodium pallidicaule is another Andean species that is eaten in the altiplano of Peru and Bolivia, where the plant is semi-domesticated.
Fruits of Chenopodium bushianum have been positively identified from archaeological sites in Illinois dating from 5000 B.C., and there are good reasons to suspect that these fruits came from a cultivated form. Much further south in central Mexico occurred another cultivated pseudograin, C. berlandieri var. nuttalliae. This plant was apparently an important crop plant for the Aztecs and probably also the people who lived before them in Mexico. This pseudograin is now being served in fine restaurants in Mexico City as huauzontle; young fruits on an inflorescence are dipped in batter and cooked. Either huauzontle or the cultivated Mexican amaranths (or both) was probably the pseudograin that was used as an annual payment to Montezuma (160,000 bushels per year of huauthi), to be stored in the eighteen Imperial Aztec granaries.