Samak Rice is a true cereal, and it belongs to Poaceae family. But in India, it is used as replacement of cereal on religious occasions. Poaceae is a family of true grasses. Most of the common cereals which we use such as Wheat, maize, rice, barley and millet belong to this family and known as True cereals. The true cereals are essentially monocots. On the other hand, there are some pseudo-cereals, which are generally not monocots and which are essentially not true grasses i.e. Don’t belong to family Poaceae. The common examples of such Pseudo-cereals are Amaranthus cruentus (Rajgir Sravani Math in India), Buckwheat (Kuttu, as it is known in India) , Quinoa (Goosefoot, there is no Hindi / Indian name for this) and breadnut. Out of the above examples, Quinoa is an important pseudo-cereal and recognizing its importance, the United Nations General Assembly declared 2013 as International Year for Quinoa.
Discusssion
Login to discuss.