For centuries our meals were not complete unless they were accompanied with a hefty side of savory, fluffy and soft white rice. Then we realized that said side makes us fluffy and soft, so we had to think up alternatives—or did we?
Thankfully, the great Inca Empire already had planted the seed (pun very much intended), as they held a special reverence for the unique crop they called chisaya mama, ‘the mother of all grains’—which we today know as quinoa. Many have taken to calling quinoa ‘the new old grain,’ because it dates back to pre-Columbian Andean civilizations, when the emperor would traditionally sow the first seeds of the harvest using tools made of pure gold.
