Amaranth: it pops!
Here’s the latest installment of my “what I learned in food testing” chronicles: Amaranth, a teeny tiny, nutritious, complete-protein, gluten-free grain, can be popped like popcorn! The raw, pale yellow grain (look for it in bulk bins) is as hard as a rock, so it’s usually cooked; but a recipe I made last week called for popping it. Here’s the procedure: Heat a 2 quart pot on very high heat; when heated, add a few amaranth kernels. When they pop, add 1 tablespoon amaranth and shake the pot constantly until most are popped, about 30 seconds. They turn white, like tiny little puffballs — and they’re a crunchy, fun texture, great for adding to cookies, bars, over cereal, or eaten straight. Don’t be tempted to pop more than a tablespoon at a time, though; it burns easily, and too much in the pan won’t pop evenly. (Yes, I found this out the hard way.)
Amaranth is also available ground up as a flour, and flaked as a cereal.
Related Topics: Food, From the Editors
March 26th, 2008 at 5:47 pm
can you put it in a popcorn popper rather than in a pan? Let me know!
March 31st, 2008 at 1:11 pm
Kristin — I don’t think a popcorn popper would work, if only because amaranth kernels are so very small (smaller than the head of a pin). I haven’t tried amaranth in a popper, but I’m guessing it would burn before it all popped; it only takes about 30 seconds per tablespoon in a very hot pan. And I’d worry that the tiny kernels might gum up a popcorn popper mechanism, depending on what kind you have.
Check out the photo below. The top bowl has raw amaranth; the right bowl has popped amaranth (see, it’s not that much bigger!); and the left bowl has over-popped (that is, slightly burned) amaranth.