(
C. quinoa) seeds The genus
Chenopodium contains several plants of minor to moderate importance as food crops as
leaf vegetables – used like the closely related
spinach (
Spinacia oleracea) and similar plants called
quelite in
Mexicoand
pseudocereals. These include
white goosefoot (
C. album),
kañiwa (
C. pallidicaule) and
quinoa (
C. quinoa). On the
Greek island of
Crete, tender shoots and leaves of a species called
krouvida () or
psarovlito () are eaten by the locals, boiled or steamed. As studied by
Bruce D. Smith,
Kristen Gremillion and others, goosefoots have a history of culinary use dating back to 4000 BC or earlier, when
pitseed goosefoot (
C. berlandieri) was a staple crop in the Native American
Eastern Agricultural Complex, and when white goosefoot was apparently used by the
Ertebølle culture of
Europe. Members of the eastern European
Yamnaya culture also harvested white goosefoot as an apparent cereal substitute to round out an otherwise mostly meat and dairy diet c.
3500–2500
BC. There is increased interest in particular in goosefoot seeds today, which are suitable as part of a
gluten-free diet.
Quinoa oil, extracted from the seeds of
C. quinoa, has similar properties, but is superior in quality, to
corn oil. Oil of chenopodium is extracted from the seeds of
epazote, which is not in this genus anymore.
Shagreen leather was produced in the past using the small, hard goosefoot seeds.
C. album was one of the main
model organisms for the
molecular biological study of
chlorophyllase. Goosefoot
pollen, in particular of the widespread and usually abundant
C. album, is an
allergen to many people and a common cause of
hay fever. The same species, as well as some others, have seeds which are able to persist for years in the
soil seed bank. Many goosefoot species are thus significant
weeds, and some have become
invasive species. We have recently gathered an abundant harvest of leaves from two or three plants growing in our garden. These leaves were put into boiling water to blanch them, and they were then cooked as an ordinary dish of spinach, with this difference in favour of the new plant, that there was no occasion to take away the threads which are so disagreeable in chicory, sorrel, and ordinary spinach. We partook of this dish with relish—the flavour—analogous to spinach, had something in it more refined, less grassy in taste. The cultivation is easy: sow the seed in April (October) in a well-manured bed, for the plant is greedy; water it. The leaves may be gathered from the time the plant attains 50 centimetres (say 20 inches) in height. They grow up again quickly. In less than eight days afterwards another gathering may take place, and so on to the end of the year.
Safety Sphaeraphides occur in the leaves, stem, pith and mesophloem. ==Fossil record==