The Amaranth solution

Amaranth is one of the world’s oldest food crops. Archaeologists have traced it to Puebla, Mexico, around 4,000 B.C., but believe it originated in Central or South America. It was consumed heartily by the Aztecs, who called it huahtli, but later prohibited by the Spaniards because of its use in religious rituals.

Studies have shown it to have cancer-preventing, anti-inflammatory and cholesterol-lowering properties. It’s relatively high in protein as well as lysine, an amino acid absent from many other grains, and it has nutritionally significant levels of vitamins C and A. It can be used as a supplemental flour in tortillas, breads, cookies, pasta and marzipan; some varieties are gluten-free.

“We believe it is a superfood,” said Pete Noll, the executive director of Puente a la Salud Comunitaria (Bridge to Community Health), a Oaxaca-based nonprofit that works toward food sovereignty in rural communities in Mexico. He said amaranth’s high protein content and low cost make it especially promising for low-income communities that suffer the “dual burden” — a tendency to be malnourished at an early age, which leads to a higher propensity for obesity in adulthood. Amaranth “has a unique fit into this enormous food crisis and health care crisis in Mexico,” he said.

While most of the products for sale in Tulyehualco are snacks and seemingly not-so-healthy sweets — tabiques, huaraches, galletas, bombons, lunitas, charolas, mueganos — the amaranteros say the products are healthy because they are all natural.

Puente promotes including more amaranth in diets, without the sweeteners, but doesn’t discount the value of alegrías in bringing recognition of the grain to a broader audience.

“The cultural aspect of alegrías is kind of an entry point,” said Noll. But if amaranth is used as a significant part of one’s diet, it should be used in health food, with no added sugar.

In addition to their retail offerings, the Tulyehualco amaranteros say they use the grain at home in everything from breads and shakes to tuna salad, meatballs and stews. The iron-rich leaves can also be cooked as a vegetable, and the stems used to feed animals.

“In Mexico City very few people know that it can be eaten in food. And how delicious it is,” said Manuel Castillo, a local amarantero.

While many of the bulk customers at the co-op shops head to Tulyehualco from Mexico City and neighboring states like Guadalajara and San Luis Potosi, the grain is unfamiliar to Mexicans in many other parts of the country.

It’s what Fernando Manzo Ramos, a professor of sustainable agriculture and development at Colegio de Posgraduados, calls an orphan crop.

“There are crops very important for countries and societies, like corn in Mexico. But amaranth, there is not an interest in terms of huge companies trying to sell it or the government trying to integrate more production … like they will do with pork or eggs,” he said. “Nobody cares about the product except those who produce and eat it.”

Those who produce, transform and eat amaranth — despite a scarcity of government subsidies for the native crop — believe that by doing so they are safeguarding a local and national tradition.

“It’s something the Aztecs used as a delicacy for the people high up, the kings,” said Castillo. “Our ancestors protected the seed, not knowing the nutrients that it had.”

Scholars say that amaranth was originally sold by only the poorest families in Tulyehualco. In the 1960s those families would make the alegrías in their kitchens and travel to markets or festivals for a day or two at a time to sell them in order to gather the necessary cash for a certain expense, such as school tuition or a home repair.

From the 1970s through the 1990s, more families supplemented their regular work by making amaranth snacks in small workshops. They kept their recipes closely guarded. Eventually families turned to full-time production, seeing in amaranth an opportunity for sustainable employment for all their members. The number of products multiplied, and families set up small shops to cater to local retail buyers and out-of-town wholesale buyers who resold the products in schools and offices.

As the demand for amaranth grew, families became more business savvy and formed co-ops that enabled them to finance business improvements — such as new equipment, more hygienic practices, better training — and to negotiate with local and federal development programs, research institutions and nonprofit organizations.

“The majority of the town, of the families, are dedicated to this,” said Rosa Maria Pérez, who with her husband, Encarnación de la Rosa, runs the Iztacoatl amaranth co-op, in which family members oversee the entire production process. “We plant it, we grow it, we harvest it, and obviously we transform it.”

With growing domestic demand for alegrías and other amaranth sweets, the Tulyehualco artisans now source much of the amaranth they use from farmers in nearby Tlaxcala state. Noll estimates there are about 25,000 acres of amaranth fields across Mexico — enough to cater only to local demand. But he’s confident that will change.

“To me, it’s only a matter of time before it’s going to become popular in the U.S., and Western markets drive a lot of what other countries produce,” he said.

Amaranth growers, producers and researchers are working together to figure out how to enter new markets like natural food stores and how to export organic amaranth seeds and flour to be used in conventional products.

But among the co-ops in Tulyehualco, there are closely guarded recipes and a constant competition to come up with the next new presentation to distinguish their products from the others.

“There is a whole lot of competition,” said Pérez, “so what we do is keep innovating so we don’t depend on only one product.” She said her store offers 35 to 40 products made from amaranth.

Uriel Molotla has been refining the recipe for his latest product, crunchy chili-covered churritos reminiscent of commercially produced spicy fries. They’re made from corn, wheat, amaranth, cactus and textured soy, then fried in vegetable oil and flavored — not exactly nutritious, but more natural than Cheetos.

“We have a very bad problem with obesity right now in Mexico. So our main objective was to make a product that’s a kind of snack but nutritious,” he said, standing outside his small, shedlike factory, where workers shake red chili powder over the just-fried sticks and put them in family-size bags.

His two adult children also work for the family business.

“Amaranth is an essential way for our young people to see an opportunity for their personal and economic well-being. But the main thing is personal — to feel satisfied by what you’re doing is very important for each one of us,” said Molotla, emphasizing how the co-ops keep family members living and working closely together. “I believe that’s very good for us.”

For Pérez and de la Rosa, it’s also a source of great pride in their community’s history.

“It’s important to us because if the tradition is lost, then the town won’t have any identity,” said Pérez. “The tradition comes from our ancestors. And precisely for that, we don’t want it to be lost.”