{"id":20451,"date":"2023-05-03T14:20:08","date_gmt":"2023-05-03T19:20:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.zocdoc.com\/blog\/?p=20451"},"modified":"2023-07-19T11:20:47","modified_gmt":"2023-07-19T16:20:47","slug":"health-benefits-of-quinoa","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.zocdoc.com\/blog\/guides\/health-benefits-of-quinoa\/","title":{"rendered":"Health Benefits of Quinoa"},"content":{"rendered":"

Once a relatively uncommon ingredient, reserved in Western culture for health food gurus and fancy restaurants, quinoa (pronounced <\/span>keen-wah<\/span><\/i>) has made a comeback in recent years as the superfood of the moment. But what exactly is it?<\/span><\/p>\n

Quinoa is a seed collected from the <\/span>Chenopodium quinoa<\/span><\/i> plant \u2013 a herbaceous annual that was first cultivated to feed livestock. It originates from South America, and is often referred to as a grain, or pseudocereal, rather than a seed. It\u2019s been around for thousands of years \u2013 in fact, the Incas called it \u2018the mother of all grains\u2019. It\u2019s even been recognised by the United Nations, who <\/span>declared the Year of Quinoa in 2013<\/span><\/a>, in order to celebrate and promote this tiny seed\u2019s potential to help tackle world hunger.<\/span><\/p>\n

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Types of quinoa<\/h2>\n

If you go to South America, you\u2019ll find multiple different types of quinoa, but in the rest of the world, we primarily get three varieties. These are:<\/span><\/p>\n