Grains, or Cereals These words are near synonyms The cereals (from Ceres, the Roman goddess of agriculture) are plants in the grass family, the Gramineae, whose members produce edible and nutritious seeds, t h e grains But cereal is also used to mean their seeds and products made from them — as in “breakfast cereals” — and the plants are sometimes called grains The cereals and other grasses are creatures of the open plain or high-altitude steppe, areas too dry for trees They live and die in a season or two, and are easily gathered and handled They grow in densely packed stands that crowd out competition, and produce many small seeds, relying on numbers rather than chemical defenses to ensure that some offspring will survive These characteristics made the grasses ideal for agriculture With our help, they have come to cover vast areas of the globe Wheat, barley, oats, and rye have been the most important grains in the Middle East and Europe; in Asia, rice; in the New World, maize, or corn; in Africa sorghum and millets The grains are of special culinary significance because they make possible beer and bread, both staples in the human diet for at least 5,000 years An oat kernel, lentils in their pod, and a hazelnut All are seeds, and consist of a living embryonic plant together with a food supply to fuel its early growth In the cereal grains, the food supply is a separate tissue, the endosperm In the beans and their relatives, and in most nuts, the food supply fills the first two leaves of the embryo, the cotyledons, which are unusually massive and thick ... growth In the cereal grains, the food supply is a separate tissue, the endosperm In the beans and their relatives, and in most nuts, the food supply fills the first two leaves of the embryo, the cotyledons,... both staples in the human diet for at least 5,000 years An oat kernel, lentils in their pod, and a hazelnut All are seeds, and consist of a living embryonic plant together with a food supply to...most important grains in the Middle East and Europe; in Asia, rice; in the New World, maize, or corn; in Africa sorghum and millets The grains are of special culinary significance because they make possible beer and bread,