San Antonio College Library

One of the plants that may be able to help solve the crisis of world hunger has been with us ever since the beginning. Cole traces the amaranth from its days in pre-Columbian Central America, in Asia and Africa, to many of today's most advanced research centers where there is an exciting revival in alternative crops. The amaranth, in its eight thousand-some years, has seen many glorious times. A high-protein flour made from its seed was once a major...

LaManda Joy, the founder of Chicago's Peterson Garden Project and a board member of the American Community Gardening Association, has worked in the community gardening trenches for years and brings her knowledge to the wider world in Start a Community Food Garden. This hardworking guide covers every step of the process: fundraising, community organizing, site sourcing, garden design and planning, finding and managing volunteers, and managing the garden...

Cob is sweeter for knowing the long, winding way by which it has come into one's hands," observe Foster and Cordell. Featuring contributions by Gary Nabhan, Alan Davidson, and others, Chilies to Chocolate will increase readers' appreciation of the foods we all enjoy, of the circuitous routes by which they have become part of our diets, and of the vital role that Native Americans have played in this process.

"The bananas we eat today aren't your parents' bananas: We eat a recognizable, consistent breakfast fruit that was standardized in the 1960s from dozens into one basic banana. But because of that, the banana we love is dangerously susceptible to a pathogen that might wipe it out. That's the story of our food today: Modern science has brought us produce in perpetual abundance--once-rare fruits are seemingly never out of season, and we breed and clone...