Millet

One US cup of millet weighs 200 grams. Going the other way, 100 grams is about 0.50 cups.

Also called millet grain, whole millet, raw millet, hulled millet, pearl millet, proso millet.

Two authoritative sources agree within tolerance. USDA FoodData Central SR Legacy (FDC 169702, Millet, raw) publishes a cup at 756 kcal and 100 g at 378 kcal, back-calculating to a cup weight of 200 g and density of 0.8454 g/mL. King Arthur's Ingredient Weight Chart lists Millet (whole) at 103 g per half cup, extrapolating to 206 g per cup and 0.8707 g/mL. The gap between the two figures is 3.0%, well inside the 10% milled tolerance, so this entry publishes USDA's figure of 200 g per cup and names both sources.

Millet's cup density of 0.8454 g/mL is unusually high for the milled category, comparable to the densities this site publishes for continuous liquids like olive oil (0.9134 g/mL). The physical mechanism is different: olive oil achieves that density as a homogeneous fluid, while millet achieves it through very tight packing of small, hard, roughly spherical kernels. Whole millet grains are approximately 2 mm across and highly regular in shape, allowing them to interlock with minimal air space when scooped. This is why sources agree closely for whole millet where they diverge for irregularly-shaped nuts and flakes: there is less physical room for measurement noise.

Millet sits in the milled category alongside other whole grains including white rice, quinoa, rolled oats and whole nuts. The category rule assigns anything that packs by scoop with air gaps to milled, and while millet packs unusually tightly for the category, it still behaves as a granular solid rather than a self-levelling liquid. The 10% category tolerance applies here, and the observed 3% agreement between sources is comfortably inside it.

Millet is one of the oldest cultivated grains, dating to at least 8000 BCE in East Asia and Africa. Today India produces the majority of the global crop, followed by Nigeria, Niger and China. In American home kitchens, millet appears most often as a gluten-free pilaf substitute for rice or bulgur, as a porridge (similar to how oatmeal is prepared), or as a whole grain addition to bread doughs for texture. Toasting the dry grain in a dry pan for a few minutes before adding water deepens its subtly sweet, corn-like flavor.

Several millet varieties are commercially available under the general name 'millet', with the most common being pearl millet (Pennisetum glaucum), proso millet (Panicum miliaceum), foxtail millet (Setaria italica) and finger millet (Eleusine coracana). The density differences between varieties are small compared to the source-level disagreement in this entry, and both USDA and King Arthur measure without specifying variety, so this entry treats them together. Regional cuisines that use one specific variety exclusively (Indian bajra, Ethiopian tef which is a related but distinct grain) may see minor density differences from the figure published here.

Millet flour is a separate product not covered by this entry. King Arthur's chart has no row for millet flour, and no clean two-source pairing was available for it at this entry's review date. When sourcing improves, a separate millet-flour entry will publish.

Whole millet is not the same as tef, which is a smaller East African grain from a different genus; not the same as sorghum, which is a larger grain from a related genus; and not the same as birdseed millet mixes, which combine multiple grain types and are not intended for human consumption.

No standards body publishes a bulk density for millet. Codex Alimentarius standards for pearl millet grains (CXS 169-1989) cover moisture content, defect tolerances, foreign matter and grade rather than physical density. Two authoritative sources agreeing within tolerance, so this entry is held at medium confidence. A third independent source matching within tolerance, particularly a standards body figure or a professional culinary reference specifying variety, would move it to high confidence.