Is barley high in histamine?
Barley is low in histamine: barley sold in Spain had none and only a little putrescine, and 28 cereal samples averaged 0.12 mg/kg. Beer, which is brewed from barley, is a different matter.
- Histamine
- Not detected
- Other amines
- Low
- Liberator
- Not on the lists we use
- DAO blocker
- No evidence
What each source says
| Source | Verdict | What it says, in our words |
|---|---|---|
| Lab measurements, Spain 1 | Measured | No detectable histamine in barley; putrescine averaged 2.19 mg/kg. |
| Review of low-histamine diets, 2020 2 | Measured | 28 cereal samples averaged 0.12 mg/kg of histamine, none above 0.89 mg/kg. |
| 10 published low-histamine diets 3 | Barley is not on the review's chart of foods the diets exclude. Beer is, and all 10 diets exclude it. | |
| SIGHI food list 4 | See source | See SIGHI's own list for its rating. |
Measured histamine
| Food tested | Samples | Histamine | Other amines |
|---|---|---|---|
| Barley sold in Spain 1 (Table 3) | 2 | not detected | putrescine mean 2.19 mg/kg (1.09–3.28); tyramine and cadaverine not detected |
| Cereals (group) 2 (Table 1) | 28 | mean 0.12 mg/kg, range nd–0.89 mg/kg | median not detected |
mg/kg = milligrams of histamine per kilogram of food. "Not detected" means below the laboratory's detection limit.
How freshness and processing change it
Dry barley keeps well and had no histamine. Cooked barley kept for several days was not measured. Malt, malt extract and malted drinks are processed from sprouted barley and were not measured either.
No histamine in barley; cooking does not create it. (measured)
Not measured. Malt is sprouted barley, and sprouting is linked to higher putrescine in soybean sprouts. (estimate)
Why we rate barley 0
Barley the grain and barley the beer sit at opposite ends of a low-histamine diet, and the difference is fermentation. A University of Barcelona team tested barley sold in Spain and found no histamine, tyramine or cadaverine. The only amine present was putrescine, at 2.19 mg/kg on average, with samples ranging from 1.09 to 3.28 mg/kg. The team's 2018 review explains that cereals in principle contain no amines other than putrescine, and that this putrescine comes from the plant itself rather than from bacteria.
The Spanish figure rests on just two samples, which is thin. The pooled cereal figure from a 2020 review by the same team covers more ground: 28 cereal samples averaged 0.12 mg/kg of histamine, and no single sample went above 0.89 mg/kg. Fresh tomato, which nine of ten published diets exclude, averaged 2.51 mg/kg.
Beer is where barley gets its reputation. All ten low-histamine diets in the team's 2021 review exclude beer, and beer sold in Spain averaged 1.23 mg/kg of histamine across 176 samples, with the highest at 21.60 mg/kg. The 2018 review puts amines in fermented products such as beer down to the microorganisms of spoilage and fermentation, not to the grain. Alcohol adds a second problem: the 2021 review notes that it competes with histamine for one of the enzymes the body uses to clear it.
Malt sits in between. It is barley that has been sprouted and dried, and it turns up as malt extract in bread, breakfast cereals and malted drinks. Nobody in our sources measured it. The 2018 review cites a study linking the high putrescine in soybean sprouts to germination, so we give malt a cautious 1 as an estimate rather than carrying the grain's 0 over.
We rate barley 0, "low". Pearl barley in soup or stew, barley cooked like risotto and barley flakes in porridge are the closest match to what was measured, because cooking does not create histamine. Cooked barley kept for several days was not measured. Barley contains gluten, which matters for coeliac disease, a separate condition; this rating says nothing about gluten.
Questions about barley and histamine
Is barley high in histamine?
No. Barley sold in Spain had no detectable histamine and only 2.19 mg/kg of putrescine on average, in line with the low figures for cereals as a group. Only two samples were tested, so the group figure matters too.
Why is beer high in histamine if barley is not?
The histamine in beer comes from fermentation, not from the grain. Beer averaged 1.23 mg/kg in 176 samples, up to 21.60 mg/kg, and all ten published diets in the 2021 review exclude it, partly because alcohol makes histamine harder to clear.
Evidence behind this page
- Barley sold in Spain had no detectable histamine, tyramine or cadaverine; putrescine averaged 2.19 mg/kg (1.09–3.28). 1
- Cereals contain no amines other than putrescine, which has a physiological origin. 1
- Across 28 cereal samples, histamine averaged 0.12 mg/kg, with a maximum of 0.89 mg/kg. 2
- Beer sold in Spain averaged 1.23 mg/kg of histamine across 176 samples, up to 21.60 mg/kg (Table 1), and all ten published low-histamine diets exclude beer (Figure 1). 3
- Amines in fermented products such as beer are attributed to spoilage and fermentative microorganisms (Section 1). 1
- Alcohol and its breakdown product acetaldehyde compete with histamine for an enzyme involved in clearing it (Section 3). 3
- The high putrescine in soybean sprouts has been linked to the germination process (Section 3.1). 1
Sources
- Sánchez-Pérez S, Comas-Basté O, Rabell-González J, Veciana-Nogués MT, Latorre-Moratalla ML, Vidal-Carou MC. Biogenic Amines in Plant-Origin Foods: Are They Frequently Underestimated in Low-Histamine Diets? Foods 7(12):205, 2018. doi:10.3390/foods7120205 (Sánchez-Pérez S et al. 2018)
- Comas-Basté O, Sánchez-Pérez S, Veciana-Nogués MT, Latorre-Moratalla M, Vidal-Carou MDC. Histamine Intolerance: The Current State of the Art. Biomolecules 10(8):1181, 2020. doi:10.3390/biom10081181 (Comas-Basté O et al. 2020)
- Sánchez-Pérez S, Comas-Basté O, Veciana-Nogués MT, Latorre-Moratalla ML, Vidal-Carou MC. Low-Histamine Diets: Is the Exclusion of Foods Justified by Their Histamine Content? Nutrients 13(5):1395, 2021. doi:10.3390/nu13051395 (Sánchez-Pérez S et al. 2021)
- Swiss Interest Group Histamine Intolerance (SIGHI). Food compatibility list for histamine intolerance. histaminintoleranz.ch (accessed November 2026), 2026. Link (Swiss Interest Group Histamine Intolerance (SIGHI) 2026)