Human beings have evolved to eat a wide range of foods. As the culmination of evolution, the species can consume all the preceding stages of plants and animals. We can eat anything, but what we do eat will create a certain quality of being that is expressed in our thoughts, feelings, perceptions, responses, actions, and behaviour. As the most developed form of life on the planet, we have a responsibility to make informed choices.
Corresponding to our evolution from sea invertebrates to the pinnacle of the animal kingdom, plants have evolved through time to become whole cereal grains. Macrobiotics holds that because whole grains evolved in parallel with human beings, they are our counterpart in the plant kingdom and should form principal food. Principal food is consumed daily and at every meal. As nuts and fruit developed with apes, and dinosaurs ate primitive vegetation, grain is food for human beings.
In the Standard Macrobiotic Diet for a temperate climate, approximately 50% of the total volume of each meal should be whole grains, including brown rice, whole wheat berries, rye, barley, oats, millet, buckwheat, quinoa, and others. Of the various grains, brown rice is the most balanced in structure and composition and is especially calming to our highly developed nervous system. Short-grain brown rice is the most nutritious and is recommended for daily consumption.
(figure from The Book of Macrobiotics, Michio Kushi)