Lupin Flakes: Your New Fave Food?

Like goji berries and matcha tea before them, lupin flakes are set to overtake the superfood scene, apparently.

Sadly, lupin flakes are not the product of beloved Hogwarts professor Remus Lupin teaming up with Cadbury to launch a new chocolate bar, but in fact the dried and chopped seeds found in the pods of lupin flowers.

Lupin flakes have been big on the wellness foodie scene Down Under for some time now, but like former Neighbours star Craig McLachlan’s pop ‘career’ and red back spiders, are they best confined to Australia itself?

Not at all! Lupin flakes have a whole host of health benefits and should be welcomed on British shores as warmly as Holly Valance’s noughties anthem Kiss Kiss.

In the Mediterranean and South America, people have actually been scoffing lupin flakes for over 3,000 years, and according to The Lupin Company – not a branch of Dumbledore’s Army, we’re afraid – they’re packed with goodness.

Lupin flakes are thought to contain three times the amount of potassium that bananas do, three times more iron than kale and three times more antioxidants than berries – that sure is a whole lotta healthiness!

They also blow everybody’s current favourite superfood grain quinoa out of the Buddha bowl, as lupin flakes are super low-calorie, have a quarter of quinoa’s carb content and three times the protein. Bonus: ‘lupin flakes’ is pronounced as it looks, not like ‘keen-wah’…

So what do lupin flakes taste like? While their look and texture is pretty similar to couscous, they don’t really taste of very much at all. But this doesn’t make them a pointless foodstuff, it actually makes them perfect for adding extra protein to things like salads and smoothies, which can be exactly what people following a plant-based diet often need.

However, anyone with a peanut allergy needs to be careful, as lupin flakes and peanuts are related so they could potentially trigger an allergic reaction.

Lupin flakes need to be prepared by boiling them in water for a few minutes (again, like couscous) so you don’t need any fancy cooking knowledge to start benefiting from these little seeds of goodness.

Serve your cooked lupin flakes with a homemade curry instead of rice, add a sprinkle of dried flakes to your morning porridge, or use them to coat meat, fish or tofu for crispy ‘breaded’ nuggets with a difference. Go on, try it!