Radio Kitchen #934 - Going With The Grains 4-12-11

Most of the grains we eat are probably ground up into and make their way into our kitchen as bags of flour.  But many grains are eaten whole,
 most obviously rice.  Thanks to the explosion of interest in unusual products from around the world, we now have a wide variety of grains available to us, and this is a case where good health comes with good flavor.
  Here's a run down on some of the most interesting.

Bulgur wheat:  This is a milled and pre-cooked form of wheat that retains the nutritional goodness of whole-grained wheat.  Using  bulgur is very easy; you can just soak it in water or broth and it's good to go.  Of course you can cook it and use it just like rice.  It is most frequently encountered as the principal ingredient in tabouleh.

Wheat berries:  This is the entire wheat grain, minus the hull.  The berry is both tender and crunchy, and packed with flavor.  They are often sprinkled over salads, but bread bakers use them frequently to add texture to their loaves.

Couscous:  Tiny milled sphere of wheat are coated with wheat flour, then cooked.  Couscous is generally used as a background element in support of savory vegetables and proteins.  It is ordinarily either steam, or gently boiled.  It cooks up very quickly,
 and its mild nutty flavor blends with many exotic seasonings.

Quinoa:  From a member of the goosefoot family, quinoa is technically a plant seed, rather than a true cereal.  The difference is unimportant.  Exceptionally nutritious, quinoa is high in protein, and is quite a complete food.  Buy the boxed version, which has already removed the inedible husk, and treat it like rice.

Amaranth:  A one-time staple crop in Europe, it is grown in the Americas and Asia.  The scarlet flowers once yielded red dyes, but the cereal like seeds are the object here.  Amaranth has the virtue of being gluten free, and thus it has great attractions.  It is a very palatable grain, and like rice,  very easy to cook.

Millet:  Arguably our oldest cultivated grain, its use predates rice in Asia.  It is commonly ground into a very tasty flour, or kept intact and prepared like other grains.  It is also a major component of bird seed.