Buckwheat

Buckwheat (or common buckwheat) is a plant whose seeds may be used as a cereal. Buckwheat is not a true grass. It is not related to wheat, because wheat is a true grass, and buckwheat is not.

Common buckwheat
Scientific classification
Kingdom:	Plantae
Division:	Magnoliophyta
Class:	Magnoliopsida
Order:	Caryophyllales
Family:	Polygonaceae
Genus:	Fagopyrum
Binomial name
Fagopyrum esculentum

Buckwheat seeds look like small beech tree seeds. Both seeds have three sides. Beech is also called buck, which is how buckwheat got its name.

Instead, buckwheat is related to sorrel, knotweed, and rhubarb. Buckwheat is referred to as a pseudocereal because its seeds are used in cooking the same as cereals, because they have complex carbohydrates.

The cultivation of buckwheat grain declined sharply in the 20th century with the adoption of nitrogen fertilizer which increased the productivity of other staples.

Buckwheat plants

Buckwheat grains (seeds)

Buckwheat Media

• 

  Buckwheat, illustration from the Japanese agricultural encyclopedia Seikei Zusetsu (1804)

• 

  Buckwheat with flowers, ripe and unripe seeds

• 

  Exhibition of Flower Festival, Taiwan

• 

  Buckwheat Flour

• 

  Buckwheat and products from it 01

• 

  Black buckwheat tea (黑苦荞茶) produced in Sichuan Province, China

• 

  Buckwheat hulls, close up.

• 

  Grechka of Russia, Ukraine and Belarus