Move Over, Quinoa: Sorghum Is the New Super-Food You’ve Never Heard Of

If you were drive across Nebraska, Iowa, Illinois, and Indiana in the United States, you would see endless fields of the grain Americans call corn, and much of the rest of the English-speaking world calls maize. If you were to drive a similar distance across South Texas, you would see endless fields of green plants with a red head of grain that Americans call maize, and most of the rest of the English-speaking world calls sorghum.

Sorghum is the super-food you probably have never heard of. About 150 years ago settlers in Texas quickly learned that their summers were far too warm for wheat and corn to survive. They started growing a plant called sorghum. This is the same lanky plant that is used to make sorghum syrup, but in the parts of the USA where sorghum is the principal crop, typically any place with good agricultural land where summer temperatures regularly exceed 100 degrees F (38 degrees C), it has been bred for a shorter stalk that is more easily mechanically harvested with a bushier red head of grain. In other parts of the world, this super food plant Sorghum bicolor more commonly has a beige seed with a reddish tint.

Before the first Iraq War, Texas exported millions of tons of sorghum to Iraq. American production of the grain is now mostly used for animal feeds. In similarly hot regions in Australia, India, Africa, and South America, sorghum is grown as grain for human consumption. It's the fifth-most widely cultivated food grain in the world. Adding to the linguistic confusion, the grain is also known as  great millet, durra, jowari, or milo. And while Americans are talented at growing sorghum, African and Asian cultures are much more skilled at turning it into tasty food.

What makes sorghum a super-food?

The primary characteristic of sorghum that makes it a super-food that it will continue to produce even in extreme heat. Summer temperatures of up to 117 degrees F (48 degrees C), don't kill it. Drought makes it more nutritious. And very few bugs attack it, especially in drought and heat.

Sorghum isn't just a crop that will survive global warming:

• Sorghum is gluten-free.
• Sorghum lowers LDL cholesterol without affecting HDL cholesterol.
• American sorghum is a potent source of antioxidants due to its red pigment.
• Combined with another hot-weather plant food, okra, sorghum provides vitamin A in amounts that prevent blindness in otherwise malnourished children.
• Sorghum contains both omega-3 and omega-6 essential fatty acids in amounts sufficient to make a difference in your health. You shouldn't use sorghum as your only source of omega-3's, but a bowl of sorghum provides about as much omega-3 as a small fish oil capsule.
• Sorghum contains 40 amino acids, and the amino acid in which it is most deficient, methionine, is easily obtained from legumes.
• Sorghum is a good source of thiamin, riboflavin, and niacin.
• Sorghum contains tannins that block the absorption of the ferric form of iron that generates free radicals and stimulates bacterial growth, but permit the absorption of the ferrous form of iron that is needed for making hemoglobin. Two servings of sorghum per day provide all the iron your body needs in a safer form than red meat.
• Sorghum contains chemicals that prevent the formation of advanced glycation products, the "caramel" formed by a reaction of glucose with hemoglobin. Indirectly it may reduce insulin resistance and help lower blood sugar levels in diabetes. It also contains chemicals that inhibit the enzymes that digest carbohydrates into simple sugars in your mouth and small intestine, leaving more starch to feed the friendly bacteria in your colon.

How Do You Cook with Sorghum?

If Americans are familiar with sorghum as an edible plant, they probably know it as sorghum syrup.

This is a molasses-like sweetener that is still used on pancakes, grits, "mush," and other hot cereals. It's a good source of manganese, magnesium, copper, zinc, vitamin B6, and potassium. It has real nutritional value, but as a source of sugar it is primarily an energy source.

Sorghum grain has many more uses. Here are just a few:

• Four parts of sorghum flour added to one part of tapioca starch (not tapioca flour) and one part of potato starch (not potato flour) makes a gluten-free flour substitute that can be used for cookies and cakes that don't require a "stretchy" dough. This can be used for brownies, quick breads and American-style (savory) biscuits, and gluten-free pizza dough, as well as cinnamon rolls. It doesn't have the gritty texture of some other gluten-free flours.
• Popped sorghum (similar to popcorn) serves as a crunchy topic for creamy soups.
• You can use sorghum to make gluten-free tabouli salad.
• Steamed sorghum kernels go well with steamed green beans and walnuts or almonds.
• Steamed sorghum kernels match radish and steamed asparagus.
• Chilled grilled vegetables with feta make a hearty salad with steamed sorghum grain.
• Steamed whole grain sorghum adds flavor and stick-to-your-ribs caloric content to Greek salads made with feta, tomatoes, cucumbers, dill, and olives.
• A combination of steamed sorghum and sweet corn can be used to stuff bell peppers for a change from rice and meat mixtures.

Sorghum is also the grain most often used to make gluten-free beer. In North America and the UK, brewers depend on sorghum to make Redbridge, New Planet Tread Lightly Blond Ale, Bard's Tale Dragon's Gold, Dogfish Head Tweason' Ale, Green's Discovery English Amber Ale, among others. Other brands use the traditional barley with the gluten extracted from it to make a more traditional-tasting beer, but sorghum beers have fruit and berry notes that aren't found in beers made with any other grain.

READ Health Benefits Of Beer

• Steamed sorghum grain, black beans, quinoa, and avocado are a tasty alternative to quinoa bowls.
• Sorghum grain can be served warm with apple, fennel, and/or kohlrabi.
• Cranberries, ginger, and sorghum make an interesting hot cereal. Sweeten to taste with sorghum syrup.
• Add precooked sorghum to your pecan pie.
• Sorghum syrup makes a great glaze for steamed carrots.
• Sorghum syrup and butter whipped at room temperature (preferably in a chilled bowl) make sorghum butter, which can be used as an ingredient in baked goods or as a sweetener for sweet potatoes or nuts. Cinnamon, cloves, and/or maple syrup add depth of flavor to the sorghum butter.
• Steamed sorghum grain is a good side dish for chicken or pork.
• Steamed sorghum grain can be added to stir-fries.
• Add steamed sorghum grain to Brunswick stew or burgoo.

Sorghum is also the main ingredient in high-quality (and not-so-high-quality) gluten-free beers. Popular brands of gluten-free beers that depend on sorghum for their mash include Redbridge by Annheuser-Busch, New Planet Tread Lightly Blond Ale, Bard’s Tale Dragon’s Gold Brown Ale, Dogfish Head Tweason’Ale (which has a fruit flavor), and Green's Quest Belgian Treipel. Sorghum beers don't taste quite as "beer like" as beers that are made with barley that has had the gluten removed, but they and fruit and berry flavors that aren't found in any other beers.