Japanese Millet

Japanese millet is an annual grass that grows one to two meters tall in warm, damp conditions, with broad leaves and dense, drooping seed heads that range from green to purple-brown. It looks much like its wild ancestor, barnyard grass, but has larger, less shattering seed heads.

The grain is small, plump, oval and about two millimeters long, enclosed in a smooth glossy hull that may be pale yellow to brown. When hulled, the grain is whitish and cooks to a mild-tasting porridge that has a slightly nutty flavor, though less refined than rice.

Seed is sold mainly by weight for planting in wildlife plots, as feed in bird mixes, and in small amounts as a specialty grain in Asia.

Echinochloa esculenta was domesticated from the weedy barnyard grass Echinochloa crus-galli in East Asia, probably in Japan, Korea and China, thousands of years ago. It is distinct from another cultivated barnyard millet, Echinochloa frumentacea, which was domesticated in India.

The species name esculenta is Latin for edible. The Japanese name hie is old and records long use as a minor staple, and the English common name Japanese millet recalls its main area of cultivation. The nickname billion-dollar grass was used in the United States in the early twentieth century to promote the grass as a forage and hay crop.

Archaeological and historical records indicate that millets, including barnyard millet, were grown in Japan and Korea from prehistoric times. Japanese millet was valued for its short growing season, which let it ripen in cool northern summers where rice was unreliable, and for its tolerance of wet soils.

In northern Japan, hie was a poor people's staple eaten as porridge or mixed with rice, and its role as a famine food made it important in hard years. After rice cultivation spread and improved, it declined as a human food, and in the twentieth century it was nearly abandoned except in a few regions and as a health-food curiosity.

Meanwhile, the grass was introduced to North America and Australia, where it became important as forage, silage and a cover crop. Today it is widely planted in the United States to feed waterfowl, doves and other wildlife on managed wetlands, and for seed mixes for game birds. A few Asian growers and food researchers are also exploring it as a gluten-free, mineral-rich millet.

As a food grain, hulled seed is cooked like rice, or mixed into rice or porridge, and it can be milled into flour for flatbreads and gluten-free baking. Its use for people is mostly regional and small in scale.

Its biggest modern use is as animal feed and wildlife food. Seeds and green forage are grown for cattle, and the seeds are valued by ducks, geese and many songbirds, so managers plant it in shallow wetlands and drained impoundments.

It is also used as a quick summer cover crop and green manure because it grows fast, shades out weeds and suppresses erosion.

Barnyard millets such as this one provide carbohydrate, protein, fiber and several minerals, and some analyses show relatively high fiber and iron content compared with polished rice. Small studies on millets in general suggest benefits for blood sugar control when they replace refined grains, but specific research on Echinochloa esculenta in people is limited. It is best seen as a traditional whole grain that adds variety to a diet and not as a proven health food.