Quinoa is Highly Nutritious and Delicious and We Love It, But Should We Eat It?

I, along with hundreds of thousands of other discerning souls, discovered quinoa several years ago, and it was love at first bite.

Quinoa is a non-grain, gluten free, high fiber, high protein, alkaline, high in healthy fat. Quinoa seemed like the answer to our prayers, a yummy, adaptable and nourishing food that even diabetics could eat.

Quinoa Nutrition Data, 1 cup cooked quinoa, 185g: 222 cal, 39g carb, 4g fat, 8g protein, 5g fiber, iron 15% DV, good source Vit E, folate, magnesium, phosphorus, manganese, estimated glycemic load 18

Savvy Vegetarian has developed many tasty quinoa recipes ^[1], showing the versatility of this not-quite-grain. And we feel that we’ve only begun to explore all the quinoa possibilities.

Sadly, quinoa has become very expensive, because the demand exceeds the supply.

For instance, Costco, the big discount chain, recently discontinued selling quinoa at many of its stores, because their supplier wasn’t able to give them the amounts they needed at the price they wanted to pay. That was a black day for quinoa lovers!

At our local natural food store, we pay close to $4 a pound now for quinoa - and that’s cheap (although not as cheap as Costco).

The reason for the scarcity is that most of the quinoa we eat is imported from South America, and grown at high altitudes in the Andes mountains by small indigenous farmers. They can only grow so much, because quinoa is kind of picky - it won’t grow just any old place.

That’s why quinoa growing hasn’t taken hold on a large scale in N. America. Although a small amount is being raised successfully in Saskatchewan by Northern Quinoa Corp. ^[2], and in Colorado at White Mountain Farm ^[3], the growers are far from able to meet anything but local demand.

Quinoa also requires extensive processing after harvesting, to get rid of the saponin coating which makes quinoa taste soapy and bitter, and can cause allergic reactions in some people.

Almost all of the quinoa available in N. America has been processed like that, so it just needs a quick rinse, not 5 thorough rinses as it would otherwise need to get rid of the saponin.

There’s another more serious downside to quinoa, beside the scarcity and the cost, and many have questioned whether we should be eating it at all.

The good news is that indigenous S. American farmers are making lots of money from growing quinoa and selling it through farming co-ops to quinoa lovers in America and Europe, who can’t get enough of it, no matter the cost.

The bad news is that quinoa was a staple food in the rural S. American diet, because that was one of the few crops they could grow, and they couldn’t afford anything else. But because of the quinoa craze, they’re growing and selling all the quinoa they possibly can.

Some say that people in quinoa growing regions aren’t eating much quinoa anymore, because now they can afford to buy other foods - like meat, rice, and tasty processed foods that previously only affluent urban S. Americans could afford. Those who want to continue eating quinoa are finding it rather expensive.

From the reports I’ve read, quinoa wasn’t well known in the S. American countries where it is grown. The farmers who grew it ate it, along with other rural residents. Of course they thrived on it, but they had to do all the processing, and their quinoa was not pre-washed, so they had to do the time and labor intensive cleaning to lose the saponin.

As far as I can tell, the farmers and others in rural S. America eat quinoa if they choose and can afford it. The government of Bolivia has taken some steps to ensure local supply by setting up agricultural subsidies for quinoa growers to support local sales, and they’re encouraging people to eat quinoa. Of course a lot depends on how well policies like that are applied.

Laetitia Mailhes in her article ‘Global Trade Conundrum: The Case of Quinoa’ ^[4], explores these issues at length and in much more depth than I do here.

To me, it’s not surprising that when the farmers got lots of money from selling quinoa, they went for a more varied, convenient diet - even if it wasn’t as nutritious. That’s a common scenario all over the world - right or wrong.

As Will Burdick said in his article Against the Global Grain, The Lesson of Quinoa’s Incredible Popularity ^[5]:

“So many people are eating a healthy food that they are driving up the demand for it, which means more people will grow it and make a living off of selling it and it will become more common and so more people will eat it.”

“It’s also a symptom of globalization generally … Some diets in Bolivia have probably been changed forever. The issues that led to that, though, are really not limited to an increased demand for quinoa. They’re geopolitical.”

What’s happening with quinoa has happened in countries all over the world, where most agricultural land and labor is taken up with cash crops grown for export to Western countries: bananas, coffee, cacao beans, coconut, rice, mangos, grapes, cashews, not to mention meat, cotton, silk, wool … the list goes on and on.

In S. America, at least the small quinoa farmers are getting some money for their crops instead of getting the shaft. But that’s only because quinoa is not suitable for industrial agriculture mono-cropping techniques.

A Little Perspective: We’re laying waste the planet to satisfy the word’s insatiable and growing meat addiction - huge ocean dead zones from fertilizer run-off, the Amazon rain forest (the lungs of the planet) disappearing at an alarming rate, and other ecological disasters.

The quinoa problem seems puny by comparison.

What To Do?

First, we could all go vegan, right smart quick. That would solve a lot of problems, as Will Anderson compellingly argues in his book This Is Hope | Green Vegans And The New Human Ecology ^[6] (highly recommend).

I know it’s not the global way - but we could give up eating imported food, including quinoa, and eat only locally grown food, or at least food grown in our own countries.

Millet is a nourishing grain which grows in Colorado, Nebraska and S. Dakota, quite close to home, and costs a lot less than quinoa. Sunflower seeds and pumpkin seeds are produced in the Midwest too, and are way cheaper than cashews.

Just about any food will grow in S.E. Iowa, where I live, and was grown, before the rich Iowa soil was given over entirely to corn, soy and Confined Animal Feeding Operations or CAFOs for hogs.

Going back to the days before industrial agriculture and globalization spoiled everything would be great! Let’s work together toward that goal before it’s too late.

Until we can persuade everyone to go vegan, and stop having kids (I don’t honestly think that’s a likely scenario), and until we develop local agriculture systems to provide a nutritious, varied diet for everyone in the area, eating a strictly local diet would be limited, nutritionally challenged, and boring. We would still need to import some food from other regions and even other countries.

For now, I’ll eat South American quinoa when I can afford it. And eat more millet. And pray that those farmers in Colorado and Saskatchewan get serious about growing quinoa.

Related Posts

^[7]Savvy Veg Adventures in Gluten Free Baking ^[7]

^[8]Is Quinoa a Carb or a Protein When Dieting? ^[8]

^[9]Food Safety Tips|Food Storage|Food Spoilage ^[9]

^[10]All About Quinoa, Gluten Free Vegetarian Quinoa Recipe ^[10]