Food species comprise spinach (Spinacia oleracea), Good King Henry (Blitum bonus-henricus), several Chenopodium species (quinoa, kañiwa, fat hen), orache (Atriplex spp.

The name is Greek for goosefoot, the common name of a genus of plants having small greenish flowers.

The Chenopodioideae are annual or perennial herbs, subshrubs, shrub or small trees.

In several species of tribe Atripliceae, the female flowers are without perianth, but enclosed by two bracts.

According to Fuentes-Bazan et al. (2012) and based on molecular genetic research, the subfamily comprises four tribes and includes about twenty-six genera: The oldest fossil records for Chenopodioideae are pollen grains recovered from Maastrichtian sediments of the Edmonton Formation in Canada.