The oldest recorded use of the quinoa plant in history occurred about 8 to 9 thousand years ago in the areas surrounding Lake Titicaca. There was evidence that the native Bolivian community cultivated the crop. The ancients were able to improve the fruit of the plant to make the seeds much larger while at the same time reducing the size of the outer shell. The plant is so versatile that the ancients used it not only for food, but also to treat certain types of diseases.
Quinoa was prepared and eaten basically like rice and is one of the three staple foods of the first peoples of Peru and Bolivia. The other two are corn and potatoes. They were also able to devise a beer made from fermented quinoa and would drink it to celebrate the new harvest.
The quinoa plant was so sacred that religious rites were performed in its honor. The most important rite occurred during the first sowing of the first quinoa seed of the new season. The Inca emperor (whom they considered a god) carried out the sowing using a golden taquiza. The ritual was passed down from generation to generation and lasted until 1532. This year marks the fall of the Incas to the Spanish.
The Spanish army killed the Inca emperor and destroyed the quinoa crop while taking the land. The conquerors suppressed all the practices and uses of quinoa, but some of the natives sneaked to the highest parts of the land to secretly cultivate the quinoa plant. People forgot about the plant until the 1970s.
Don McKinley and Stephen Gorad were students of Bolivian spiritual leader Oscar Ichazo. The two signify that they built Quinoa Corporation in 1983 in Boulder, Colorado and today quinoa is grown in the Colorado Rockies and on the Canadian prairies. However, most of the quinoa marketed in the US comes from South America.