Is millet high in histamine?

Why we rate millet 0

Millet is a true cereal, a small-seeded grass, and in Europe and North America it is sold mostly as hulled grain, flakes and flour, often as a gluten-free alternative to wheat. It has not been measured in any of the studies we use. The University of Barcelona team's Spanish database covers eight cereal products, namely barley, white and wholemeal bread, a corn and chocolate breakfast cereal, oats, wheat pasta, rice and wheat germ, and millet is not one of them. It does not appear on the team's 2021 chart of foods excluded by ten published low-histamine diets either.

Because millet is a cereal, the group data are the closest guide we have. Every cereal product the team tested had no detectable histamine, and 28 cereal samples pooled in a 2020 review averaged 0.12 mg/kg, none above 0.89 mg/kg. The 2018 review explains that in principle cereals contain no amines other than putrescine, which comes from the plant rather than from bacteria. In the grain products that were measured, average putrescine was at most 2.4 mg/kg, in rice, with wheat germ the exception at 31.64 mg/kg.

How millet is made and stored points the same way. Hulled millet and millet flakes are dried and sold dry, with no fermentation. Histamine in food forms mainly when bacteria break down the amino acid histidine, which is why fermented foods and spoiled fish and meat are the usual sources.

Millet does get fermented in some cuisines, into sour porridges, batters and drinks, and none of those were measured. The nearest evidence is a 2024 laboratory study of kisra, a Sudanese flatbread made from naturally fermented sorghum, another small-grained cereal. Histamine rose from none in the fresh batter to 6.64 mg/kg within the first 24 hours of fermentation, and the baked bread had 14.76 mg/kg. That is one study of a different grain, but it shows a cereal that starts with no histamine can gain some when it is fermented, so we rate fermented millet foods 2 as an estimate.

We rate millet 0, "low", as an estimate, and this page says plainly that it was not measured. Millet cooked fresh as porridge, pilaf or a side dish is the form the rating covers. Cooked millet kept in the fridge for several days was not measured, and we rate it 1 because it is stored moist.

Questions about millet and histamine

Is millet low in histamine?

Probably, but it has not been measured in the studies we use. It is a cereal sold dry and unfermented, and every cereal those studies tested had no detectable histamine, so we rate plain millet low as an estimate.

Are fermented millet foods high in histamine?

They were not measured. In a lab study of naturally fermented sorghum flatbread, histamine went from none to 14.76 mg/kg by the time the bread was baked, so we rate fermented millet foods moderate as an estimate.

Evidence behind this page

• Millet was not among the eight cereal products in the Spanish database (barley, white and wholemeal bread, corn and chocolate breakfast cereal, oats, wheat pasta, rice and wheat germ) (Section 2 and Table 3). ⁵
• Every cereal product in the Spanish database had no detectable histamine, and cereals contain no amines other than putrescine, which has a physiological origin (Section 3.3). ⁵
• Across 28 cereal samples, histamine averaged 0.12 mg/kg, with a maximum of 0.89 mg/kg (Table 1). ¹
• In naturally fermented kisra, a Sudanese sorghum flatbread made in the laboratory, histamine rose from none to 6.64 mg/kg in the first 24 hours of fermentation and reached 14.76 mg/kg after baking (Section 3.1.3, Figure 3A). ²
• Histamine in foods is formed mainly by bacteria decarboxylating histidine, so fermented and spoiled foods are the ones likely to accumulate it (Section 1). ³

Sources

1. 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)
2. Hassan AAA, Jin YH, Mah JH. Effects of Lactic Acid Bacteria on Reducing the Formation of Biogenic Amines and Improving the Formation of Antioxidant Compounds in Traditional African Sourdough Flatbread Fermentation. Antioxidants 13(7):844, 2024. doi:10.3390/antiox13070844 (Hassan AAA et al. 2024)
3. 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)
4. 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)
5. 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)