Educational information, not medical advice — ask your doctor or midwife.
Amaranth is a tall, leafy crop grown for its tiny seeds and its edible greens. The seed is cooked like a grain and is naturally gluten-free. Folk healers also used the plant as an astringent, meaning something that tightens and dries tissue.
The plant on this page is Amaranthus hypochondriacus. It is also called prince's feather and red cockscomb. Close relatives, including pigweed and callaloo greens, are used in much the same way.
As a food, amaranth is well understood and safe for most people. As a medicine, the human evidence is thin. A few small trials have looked at blood fats and blood sugar, with mixed results.
Traditional use tells you that people valued a plant. It does not prove that the plant works, and it does not prove that it is safe. That point applies to everything below, so this page says it once here.
Most of what is claimed for amaranth comes from lab work and from its make-up as a food, not from trials in people.
The traditional astringent use rests on tannins. Tannins bind to proteins in the lining of the mouth and gut. That is why a strong leaf tea tastes puckering and feels drying.
The seed oil is rich in squalene. In animal studies, amaranth oil appears to shift blood fats a little. Whether it does the same in people is not settled.
Amaranth grain carries fibre, plant sterols and polyphenols such as rutin. In cell and animal studies these appear to slow fat uptake and dampen markers of inflammation. These are early findings, not proof of a health effect.
Some of the grain's starch resists digestion. In small human studies this gives a gentler rise in blood sugar than some refined grains. That is a food effect, and it is modest.
Amaranth is sold mainly as a food.
Common forms: - Whole grain, cooked like porridge or a side dish - Flour, usually blended with other flours for baking - Popped or puffed seed, used in bars and cereals - Fresh or frozen leaves, cooked as a green - Cold-pressed seed oil, in bottles or capsules - Dried leaf for tea, and tinctures, in herbal shops
The grain needs cooking. Raw seed is hard to digest and tastes bitter.
Supplement oil and leaf tinctures are far less standardised than food. Strength is not consistent between brands.
Amaranth has two separate histories: one as a staple food, one as a folk remedy.
It was a major grain in Mexico and Central America long before European contact. Aztec records describe it in both food and ritual use. Spanish rulers suppressed the crop, and it faded for centuries before returning as a health food.
In nineteenth-century American practice, Eclectic physicians listed prince's feather as an astringent. King's American Dispensatory described leaf and root preparations for loose bowels, for sore mouths and throats, and for heavy menstrual bleeding.
It was always a minor plant in that tradition. It was used when stronger astringents were not to hand. These writings record what practitioners believed, not what was tested.
See a doctor if diarrhoea lasts more than two days, contains blood, or comes with fever or signs of dehydration.
See a doctor if your periods soak through a pad or tampon every hour, or if you feel faint or short of breath. That needs proper assessment, not an herb.
Get urgent help for one-sided back or side pain with blood in your urine, which can mean a kidney stone.
Call emergency services for swelling of the lips, tongue or throat, a widespread rash, or trouble breathing after eating amaranth.
Take a baby to hospital at once if their lips or skin look blue or grey after eating leafy greens.
In the United States, the United Kingdom and the European Union, amaranth grain, flour, leaves and seed oil are ordinary foods. Supplements are sold as food supplements and may not be marketed as treating any disease. The red dye named amaranth (E123) is a separate synthetic colour, banned in US food and restricted in other countries.
Evidence grades and traditional-use labels are explained in our methodology. Nothing here is medical advice.
Reviewed by the HealisticMD editorial team How we grade evidence →
The published evidence for Amaranth is weak or absent. That usually means no controlled trial has tested it, not that a trial found it ineffective — the two are different, and we grade only what has been published.
What it is typically used for, usual dose, cautions, and the study behind it where real trial data exists.
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