EAT RIGHT Breakfast Discussion 2 - Grains, Gluten and Fads

Going ‘gluten-free’ is all the rage at the moment. The awareness of gluten, and the harm it can cause to some, has soared and caused widespread fear. So now going ‘gluten-free’ isn’t just for those with coeliac disease - it’s the diet of choice for Hollywood starlets and health nuts alike. Even in the absence of any undesirable symptoms, gluten is being perceived as something to be avoided.

The widespread fear of gluten has also had a knock-on effect on grains, and carbohydrates in general. Diets such as ‘The Caveman Diet’ and the ‘Atkins Diet’, which involve cutting out entire food groups, are now extremely popular. At Rude Health we feel that there’s a general misunderstanding around gluten, grains and what it all really means. So we invited more of the best of the industry to explore their views on grains and the general recent changing attitudes towards them at London's new healthy cafe, The Detox Kitchen. 

We were joined by the likes of London's top holistic health coach and yoga instructor Julie Montagu, Hip and Healthy magazine editor Sadie Macloed, blogger of the moment Madeleine Shaw, Psycle instructor Rhian Stephenson, and Arganic founder Dana Elemara. Also represented were co-author of Honestly Healthy's best selling book Vicki Edgson, food writer and cook Signe Johansen, Waitrose Kitchen staff writer Anna Marie Julyan, and personal trainer Scott Ashley. 

Here's a few of the topics that we wanted to explore:Are all grains equally good or bad? What is your grain of choice and why? Gluten-free and grain-free, the new health fad? View on the current trend for ancient, rather than local and traditional grains.  

Outspoken Rude Health co-founder Nick Barnard (far right) kicked off the debate with a few words about our own views on grains:

We feel that the extreme reaction of coeliacs to gluten caused a huge improvement in gluten labelling. Food producers are now even starting to bring out more gluten-free foods. Fantastic news of course for those with coeliac disease, but is it entirely necessary for the rest of us? Can we assume that all ‘gluten-free’ foods are necessarily good for us? Just because a cupcake is labelled ‘gluten-free’, does that automatically mean that it’s also unprocessed or unsweetened? Think about it.  

Studies suggest that only 1 in 100 people have the disease. So why are we punishing ourselves by cutting out foods that we love, such as the odd slice of freshly baked sourdough, artisan bread? The smell alone is almost impossible to resist. Is it possible that we are victims of the latest dietary fad or buzzword?

At Rude Health we have no intention of giving up our favourite foods. All we do is make sure that we use a variety of grains, we keep them whole and produce them in the most natural, sustainable way possible.

Vicki Edgson (above) was trained at the Institute for Optimum Nutrition and travels extensively around the country speaking at lectures and seminars. She is a true food educator. She believes in getting back to basics, eating nutritionally dense whole-grains in their original form. "It's hugely beneficial.  We need to look to artisan bread-making methods, and get our own hands in to knead our own dough - the nutritional benefits of sprouted grains in particular is fantastic, and great to know that Rude Health are already onto this!"

Signe Johansen (left) has written a few books of her own. She embraces her scandinavian heritage and culture when it comes to food. "As a cook I really believe grains are not only a vital source of energy, but they also provide flavour, texture and above all, joy. To a Scandi, few things beat a slice of dark rye bread, thinly sliced and topped with silky, home-cured gravlaks, pickled cucumber and a slick of creme fraiche. Winters would be even more bleak without a bowl of warming oat porridge to start the day. And pearled spelt makes the most versatile base for summer salads, replete with seasonal vegetables, nuts and seeds... Healthy and delicious don't have to be mutually exclusive, so let's stop fearing carbs and start embracing the diversity of good grains. After all, boring old wheat hasn't got a patch on power grains such as spelt, rye, oats, corn, rice, barley, freekeh, buckwheat, quinoa, amaranth and teff!"

Madeleine Shaw (left) used to suffer from bloating and discomfort due to a poor diet made up of a lot of 'low-fat' and refined, processed foods. Yet after living out in Sydney for three years, learning how to cook at a 'paleo' cafe, she started to notice some improvements, but felt she was overcompensating her lack of carbohydrates with protein. Trial and error has gotten her to a place where she now believes in balance, which involves incorporating healthy and unrefined grains into the diet.  

Dana Elemera (right) is passionate about the idea that food is the key to our health when it comes to medicine, productivity and beauty. "Life is too short to not allow yourself to enjoy a nice artisan piece of sourdough with some proper butter once a week. Asking what's in your food and how it's made is more important than cutting out an entire food group - it's not sustainable. Things that are less processed and contain no weird ingredients are easier for both the body to digest and understand. This means it won't mess with your metabolism. There are many free-from products out there with lots of strange ingredients in them to make up for what's missing which I wouldn't go near but you see others eating them in abundance without any question. We need to be mindful by listening to our bodies rather than just following fads or textbooks. Lets use our common sense, a bit of gluten combined with a nutrient rich diet allows you to enjoy it without reacting badly, so moderation and variety is key."  

Anna Marie Julyan believes that we're living in exciting times. "There's a lot of work to be done but varied grains are increasingly appearing on shop shelves and in recipe books. We're rediscovering the grains we used to eat and others that form the staple part of other food cultures: spelt, quinoa, buckwheat, rye, amaranth, teff... All of these have the potential to enrich people's diets with nutrient dense, tasty foods. On my way home from the Rude Health breakfast I walked past a corner shop with fridges full of sliced white sandwiches and sausage rolls – hopefully we can reach a point where the same fridges offer foods made with a wealth of different grains."

Rude Health co-founder Camilla Barnard (above). However different everyone’s opinion, the thing that united us was a commitment to better education and to encourage people to think harder about their food and the processes they go through  It’ll be a long road, but with more discussions like these and influencers getting behind the issue we can move in the right direction, one step at a time.

See all the photo's of the event on our Facebook page. And read our view on grains on our previous blogpost: Why you should think twice about going gluten free

Eat right, stay brilliant. 

#getyourgrains

www.rudehealth.com

Think twice about going gluten free part 2: What you knead to know about bread

There’s so much more to say about the whole wheat and gluten debacle, that we thought we’d let our good friends over at the Real Breal Campaign do some of the talking. It’s Real Bread Maker Week after all!

Isn’t Real Bread great?!

If, for any explicable reason, your answer to that wasn’t ‘hell, yeah!’ then you might want to grab yourself a bowl of porridge and sit this one out as that’ll be the gist pretty much from here on in.

From 10-16 May, Real Bread Maker Week celebrates the genuine article and its creators, and encourages people to support local bakeries or get making their own Real Bread.

Just think: with only three or four basic and utterly affordable ingredients anybody – and that includes more than 10,000 kids who’ve baked thanks to the Real Bread Campaign’s work – can make a loaf.  Taking things to another level, the skilled hands of a true artisan baker (rather than the whirring whatevers of an industrial loaf fabricator) can elevate flour arranging to an art form.  Delicious, nutritious and, if bought from a local, independent bakery, helps to keep your high street alive.

Not all loaves are created equal

Now, if you were reticent with your ‘hell, yeah’ back there, a perfectly explicable reason might have been if you’ve had gyp when eating a supermarket or factory loaf and by (perhaps misguided) association you’ve tarred Real Bread with the same brush.  The thing is, not all loaves are created equal. 

All the time, people write or chat to members of the Real Bread Campaign, saying things like: ‘I can’t eat supermarket loaves at home, but when I eat Real Bread on holiday in France or Italy, I have no problem.’ They then seek out a Real Bread bakery back in the UK and find they can enjoy a local loaf here, too.

Testing, testing 1, 2

Around 1% of people are unfortunate enough to have coeliac disease*. Though reliable figures for wheat allergy and intolerance are hard to come by, it seems that these conditions could also affect around one in a hundred people.

So why is the perception that such conditions affect more people? There is a chance that some self-made diagnoses are inaccurate. Two things we’d hate to see:

Someone with a genuine medical condition putting him/herself at risk anyone unnecessarily depriving themselves of Real Bread!

If you think you have a problem but haven’t been tested professionally, go now! You might find you can in fact enjoy genuine, long-fermented sourdough or even Real Bread in general. But please do get yourself diagnosed before you start experimenting…

Seeds of change

If there has been any genuine rise in people with real problems in the sarnie department, why might that be?

Over the years, many changes have occurred to links in the chain from seed to sandwich. Way back when, wheat was a rangy old thing, with stalks sometimes reaching the six foot mark. For a whole sheaf of reasons, boffins worked to curb the plant’s lofty ambitions, breeding strains that were short with fat heads. I’m sure there’s a gag to be had there, but I’ll move on.  

What we as a Campaign would be interested to know is: while everyone was chasing after creating stubby, high-yielding wheats with oodles of strong gluten to make big, fluffy white loaves, what other unforeseen and unnoticed mutations might have taken place?  Could the proteins have been altered in ways that have made them less digestible to more people?

The modern ‘conventional’ farming system deploys a huge agrochemical arsenal to boost growth, inhibit growth, kill things and so on. Residues of some of these can find their way into our food, so could they be causing some people grief?

Slowly does it 

Something like 80% of the loaves sold in the UK are contrived by the Chorleywood ‘Bread’ Process. This utilises high speed mixing, a fair dollop of bakers’ yeast and perhaps ten or more artificial additives to slash production time to about ninety minutes from start to finish.

Leaving aside questions that hang over this chemical cocktail (though could that be a culprit?), compare this process to the hours that Real Bread bakers allow for their dough to ‘ripen’ in its own good time. Now just think of the problems you have eating an unripe tomato and ask: is it the commodity loaf process that allows virtually no fermentation time that some people might find hard to stomach?

Just what’s kneaded

We’ve challenged the Big Bakers, the loaf fabricators for whom the industry’s worth more than three billion quid a year, to fund research into this last issue. You’d think it would be in their interest to invest in finding out why so many people report they can no longer eat their products, but no, the manufacturers just grumble there’s no evidence that longer fermentation offers any benefits. The thing is, what they really mean is that not enough research has been carried out to generate conclusive evidence one way or the other.

But enough of the questions for now, it’s Real Bread Maker Week, so let’s toast the true value loaf!

#getyourgrains

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Chris Young coordinates the Real Bread Campaign for the food and farming charity Sustain. Membership is open to everyone and offers a range of discounts and other benefits.

realbreadcampaign.org

@RealBread

*for those who don’t know, this isn’t an allergy but an autoimmune disorder. Basically, a sufferer’s immune system is, frankly, proper screwed up and starts attacking the body any time he or she eats even a tiny amount of gluten, a complex of proteins found in wheat and certain other cereals.