Oh hello, vegan friends. Do you have any dinner plans? No? Well, there’s a new restaurant in town called The Truth but you’ll have to get off your moral high horse to eat there.

Turns out the wonder grain quinoa, which many vegans have started eating rapaciously over the last several years for its high protein content, is making life pretty miserable in Bolivia, Peru and other Andean countries where it is grown and where it has long been a staple. As the Guardian reported yesterday, the price of quinoa has tripled since 2006 and is now too expensive for many people for whom it constitutes a large part of their diets.

Of course, it’s not just vegans who have driven up the price. Quinoa is the trendy health food of the day, much like açaí berries and coconut water before it, a necessary ingredient in the pantry of any careful gourmet. Most of the international demand comes from the United States, Europe, Japan and Canada. But in return for all those sweet amino acids in your salad, some poor people in South America have been going without or resorting to “imported junk food.” There’s also strong pressure to ramp up quinoa farming at the expense of a variety of other crops.

By the way, the United Nations has declared 2013 the international year of quinoa — because the UN has to do something, I suppose, but also due to quinoa’s image as a “super food.” With increased demand all over the world, quinoa also has to travel farther before it gets to our plates. So I hope you all enjoy your immoral super food while I drive over to McDonald’s for an also-immoral cheeseburger.

Christ, is there any way to eat ethically?

The GuardianFlickr