Amaranth: The Happiness Plant
from The Permaculture Activist 70:44-46 (Winter 2008-09)
Palmer amaranth can grow as tall as 15 feet, although 6 feet is more common. Climate change is its best friend. It can continue to grow an inch a day even without water all summer, even when daily temperature tops 90°F (32°C). Its flowering tops put out half a million seeds per plant. One successful amaranth plant can seed an entire field for the following season. Full grown, the new superweed eats cotton picking machinery and spits out the metal parts.
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In the Mexican states of Guerrero, México, Michoacán, Morelos, Puebla, Tlaxcala, Oaxaca and Jalisco, and the Guatemalan departments of Guatemala, Chimaltenango and Alta Verapaz, Palmer amaranth seeds are dried, mixed with maguey honey and baked into a candy that is sold in the central markets. The toasted seeds are so valuable they bring four times more pesos per kilo than corn. A healthy mix of amino acids makes Palmer amaranth a complete protein, but it can also use its abundant lysine to complete the protein of maize.
It is not called pigweed in Mexico. In the hill villages of Puebla where Nahua culture still lives, it is called huautli or bledos, “feather.” Coras call it bé-be and Huicholes wa-ve. In Tlaxcala, its called alegría, “happiness.”
The alegría amaranth was used as both a cultivated food and a medicinal plant by American civilizations as far south as the Inca (where it is known as kiwicha in the Andes today) and as far back as 6000 years. An Aztec Codex tells of 4,000 tons of amaranth arriving in Tenochtitlán, the Aztec capitol, every year. The leaves were cooked as spinach and the seeds were ground for porridge or bread. An atoli drink was made from water and huautli flour and is still being sold in rural markets today. Huautli flour dough filled with steamed amaranth leaves was called by the Aztecs huauquillamalmaliztli. When fresh seeds are cooked they become gelatinous, lending themselves to a variety of recipes where a binder is desirable.
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From the standpoint of human nutrition, Palmer amaranth has few equals.
Amino Acids in grams per cup
Tryptophan 0.353
Threonine 1.088
Isoleucine 1.135
Leucine 1.714
Lysine 1.457
Methionine 0.441
Cystine 0.372
Phenylalanine 1.057
Tyrosine 0.642
Valine 1.324
Arginine 2.067
Histidine 0.759
Alanine 1.558
Aspartic acid 2.459
Glutamic acid 4.405
Glycine 3.190
Proline 1.361
Serine 2.239
Palmer amaranth has 4.2 mg Vitamin C per 100 grams and similarly healthy doses of riboflavin, niacin, pantothenic acid, Vitamin B-6, folate, and Vitamin E. It is high in calcium, magnesium, phosphorus, potassium, zinc, iron and manganese, and low in sodium, with zero cholesterol. In fact, it may lower cholesterol because of its stanols and squalene content. It is 14 percent protein, 66 percent carbohydrate, and 7 percent fatty acids, primarily polyunsaturated. Several studies have shown amaranth seed oil useful for the treatment of hypertension and cardiovascular disease. Regular consumption reduces blood pressure and improves some immune system functions.
Read more about the " happiness plant " here:
http://peaksurfer.blogspot.com/2008/...ess-plant.html
Kindness
mudra