Cereal crops

A cereal crop is a grass cultivated for its edible grain. Cereals are the world's largest crops, and are therefore staple foods. They include rice, wheat, rye, oats, barley, millet, and maize. Edible grains from other plant families, such as buckwheat and quinoa, are pseudo-cereals. Most cereals are annuals, producing one crop from each planting, though rice is sometimes grown as a perennial. Winter varieties are hardy enough to be planted in the autumn, becoming dormant in the winter, and harvested in spring or early summer; spring varieties are planted in spring and harvested in late summer.

Cereals were domesticated in the Neolithic Era around 8,000 years ago. Different species were domesticated in different parts of the world, in turn creating a rich, diverse variety of cereal crops found all over. One of the main Pillars of Culture is food, and the traditions around growing, preparing, and sharing it. Cereal and pseudo-cereals being staples foods means that they have had a huge impact on culture, and their diversity shows in all of the different ways we prepare them.

From tortillas to sourdough to the cereal boxes we find on grocery store shelves, we can see how these crops impact us. Cereals were chosen as staples because of their diverse nature and ability to create high starch food. Not only are they high in starch, they're yummy too. And so, they became staples.

Plants - like people - are diverse in nature. The wheat that was grown in Italy 500 years ago was, in fact, wheat, but it was different than the wheat that was grown in France. And so how they prepared their wheat and what they turned it into was unique in its own way, and for a variety of reasons. Diversity is like a fractal - the more you look at it, the more you see.

Before globalization, when the world felt much larger, and distant places were not so easy to get to, if one traveled around the world one would see that there were different types of plants - and therefore food - found all over the place. Some plants one would only see in that place, and others would look quite familiar, albeit different in their own way.

Wheat and barley were originally domesticated in the Fertile Crescent; rice was domesticated in East Asia, and sorghum and millet were domesticated in West Africa. Maize was domesticated by Indigenous peoples of the Americas in southern Mexico about 9,000 years ago.

Many species of this plant family have their own

Cereals provide food eaten directly as whole grains, usually cooked, or they are ground to flour and made into bread, porridge, or other products. Cereals have a high starch content, enabling them to be fermented into alcoholic drinks such as beer. Cereal farming has a substantial environmental impact, and is often produced in high-intensity monocultures. The environmental harms can be mitigated by sustainable practices which reduce the impact on soil and improve biodiversity, such as no-till farming and intercropping.

Some Cereal Crops & Pseudo-Cereal Crops

• Barley
• Oats
• Wheat
• Sorghum
• Maize (Corn)
• Millet
• Rice
• Rye
• Quinoa
• Triticale
• Fonio
• Buckewheat
• Teff
• Wild Rice
• Amaranth
• Einkorn
• Durum Wheat

Effects on the Environment

Cereal production has a substantial impact on the environment. Tillage can lead to soil erosion and increased runoff. Irrigation consumes large quantities of water; its extraction from lakes, rivers, or aquifers may have multiple environmental effects, such as lowering the water table and cause salination of aquifers. Fertilizer production contributes to global warming, and its use can lead to pollution and eutrophication of waterways. Arable farming uses large amounts of fossil fuel, releasing greenhouse gases which contribute to global warming. Pesticide usage can cause harm to wildlife, such as to bees.

Some of the impacts of growing cereals can be mitigated by changing production practices. Tillage can be reduced by no-till farming, such as by direct drilling of cereal seeds, or by developing and planting perennial crop varieties so that annual tilling is not required. Rice can be grown as a ratoon crop; and other researchers are exploring perennial cool-season cereals, such as kernza, being developed in the US.

Fertilizer and pesticide usage may be reduced in some polycultures, growing several crops in a single field at the same time. Fossil fuel-based nitrogen fertilizer usage can be reduced by intercropping cereals with legumes which fix nitrogen. Greenhouse gas emissions may be cut further by more efficient irrigation or by water harvesting methods like contour trenching that reduce the need for irrigation, and by breeding new crop varieties.

Uses

Direct consumption

Some cereals such as rice require little preparation before human consumption. For example, to make plain cooked rice, raw milled rice is washed and boiled. Foods such as porridge and muesli may be made largely of whole cereals, especially oats, whereas commercial breakfast cereals such as granola may be highly processed and combined with sugars, oils, and other products.

Flour-based foods

Main article: Flour

Cereals can be ground to make flour. Wheat flour is the main ingredient of bread and pasta. Maize flour has been important in Mesoamerica since ancient times, with foods such as Mexican tortillas and tamales. Rye flour is a constituent of bread in central and northern Europe, while rice flour is common in Asia.

A cereal grain consists of starchy endosperm, germ, and bran. Wholemeal flour contains all of these; white flour is without some or all of the germ or bran.

Alcohol

Further information: Beer and Ethanol fermentation

Because cereals have a high starch content, they are often used to make industrial alcohol and alcoholic drinks by fermentation. For instance, beer is produced by brewing and fermenting starch, mainly from cereal grains—most commonly malted barley. Rice wines such as Japanese sake are brewed in Asia; a fermented rice and honey wine was made in China some 9,000 years ago.

Animal feed

Further information: Animal feed

Cereals and their related byproducts such as hay are routinely fed to farm animals. Common cereals as animal food include maize, barley, wheat, and oats. Moist grains may be treated chemically or made into silage; mechanically flattened or crimped, and kept in airtight storage until used; or stored dry with a moisture content of less than 14%. Commercially, grains are often combined with other materials and formed into feed pellets.

Nutrition

Whole-grain and processed

As whole grains, cereals provide carbohydrates, polyunsaturated fats, protein, vitamins, and minerals. When processed by the removal of the bran and germ, all that remains is the starchy endosperm.

Amino acid balance

Further information: Complete protein and Protein combining

Some cereals are deficient in the essential amino acid lysine, obliging vegetarian cultures to combine their diet of cereal grains with legumes to obtain a balanced diet. Many legumes, however, are deficient in the essential amino acid methionine, which grains contain. Thus, a combination of legumes with grains forms a well-balanced diet for vegetarians. Such combinations include dal (lentils) with rice by South Indians and Bengalis, beans with maize tortillas, tofu with rice, and peanut butter with wholegrain wheat bread (as sandwiches) in several other cultures, including the Americas. For feeding animals, the amount of crude protein measured in grains is expressed as grain crude protein concentration.