Grain bashing: It’s easy

When I chose to pick on grains, I found it exceptionally easy. There is no shortage of warts, scars, and defects in this class of plants co-opted into the service of the human diet. I chose to pick on wheat first, as it is the worst of grains with more complex genetics and thereby a greater panel of unique proteins; it is among the most changed by the efforts of geneticists and agribusiness; and it plays such a dominant role in the human diet, comprising 20% of all calories worldwide, as much as 50% or more of calories for many people. But just because other grains are not wheat does not make them good. After all, all grains are the seeds of grasses, grasses from the biological family Poaceae, relatives of the Kentucky bluegrass or rye grass that grow in your back yard. Let’s talk about corn. Just as wheat consumption began around 10,000 years ago in the Fertile Crescent when desperate humans wondered whether they could consume einkorn wheat that grew wild, so did inhabitants of Mesoamerica (now Mexico) wonder whether they could consume the teosinte grass that grew wild. Teosinte looks like a grass, as the mutation of a large seed head–”cob”–had not yet appeared. Domestication and cultivation of teosinte led to maize. Over time, farmers chose plants with larger seeds and seed heads that eventuated in something closer to the huge cob we all recognize today. Corn has the advantage of being very prolific: high yields. As strains with large seeds ...
Source: Wheat Belly Blog - Category: Cardiology Authors: Tags: Corn Grains Source Type: blogs