Chia seed is considered one of the amazing seed types in the healthy seed list. Chia or Salvia hispanica is a member of the mint family. This plant is original from America (Mexico and Guatemala) and is also a popular food source in this continent. The chia seed contains high level of nutrition content and is considered as a novel seed. Nowadays, chia is widely used in many areas.
Description
Salvia hispanica is an annual herb with the height up to 1.75m. Flowers of the plants are like spike with clusters and slight purple color. The name chia is originated from Nahuatl word “chian” which means “oily”, and the shorten form chia seems easy to call and is also popular the most.
Chia seeds are tiny like basil seed and also shining. The color is mottle ranges from brown, white, gray to black.
Chia seed is hydrophilic. When soaking, it will expand as is covered by a gel-layer coat and its weight could be increased 12 times compared with its normal weight.
Nutrition content
The level of nutrition content in chia seed is very high and is compared with other nutritious foods as salmon, milk, beef, orange fruit, maize, broccoli, banana…For 100g of chia, there is more than 50% of daily value of thiamin and niacin, more than 20% daily value of minerals as calcium, iron, magnesium, manganese, phosphorus and zinc, more than 10% of daily value of riboflavin and folate…
Besides, to date, there is still no evidence of harm affection of chia to the consumers. It is one of the safe food sources to human.
As food
Chia seeds are a little crispy and almost flavorless so we could add them to any dish that we like.
The chia seed could be used after soaking or added directly to the food.
There are numbers of dish that could use chia seed as supplement but some of them that we could finish simply and quickly as smoothies, breads, yogurts, beverages, salads, cakes…It’s possibly if we ate the seeds raw and then drank water.
In baking, chia seeds both provide numbers of nutrient and could replace around 25% content of egg and oil if used.
The nutritional content of chia seed is completely negative with its out look, the seeds at very small size. Perhaps we should named it a type of super seed.
