WHOLE GRAINS
One of the new food guide recommendations released Wednesday by the USDA says we suggests an increased intake of whole grain foods. This has those in the grain industry celebrating, and rolling out new products almost immediately.
“I don’t like the refined flours,” says Cassandra as she shops. She goes out of her way to buy whole grain breads. But even she says it’s confusing. “I can never really tell. I just make sure that it says 100% whole grain wheat.”
For the first time, the government is saying if you’re going to eat carbs, make sure a significant portion contains whole grains rather than refined grains.
For the baked-goods industry, it’s a modest but significant win. After suffering through the low carb craze, bread is back, or at least whole grain bread is.
Now a grain is not always a whole grain. This means just because you’re getting seven, or nine or even twelve grains in your bread, doesn’t mean you’re getting the right grains.
Cathy Nonas, a nutritionist and Director of the Obesity Program at North General Hospital, says, “Whole grain means the whole kernel. Whole grain includes the bran and the seed, so it has fiber and it has a lot more calcium in it. In addition it also has a lot more vitamins and minerals. Manufacturers are trying to get consumers to distinguish between products labeled ‘Wheat Flour’ and those labeled ‘100% Whole Wheat Flour’.”
Whole grains contain b-vitamins, soluble and insoluble fibers, folate, zinc, protein, iron, and magnesium.
Experts say until labeling criteria become clearer, it’s going to be difficult to tell which products are truly whole grain. In the meantime, the best advice is to look for labels that indicate that a product has 100% whole wheat flour as its main ingredient.
And don’t be fooled by the color. Nonas says you can’t always say that brown is better Manufacturers are known to make artificially brown bread which looks like whole grain bread, but in fact may be very low in whole wheat flour.
Now, however, several major food manufacturers are designing food lines aimed at targeting the high whole grain shoppers. General Mills says it’s reworked several of its popular cereal lines to be in store shelves by the end of the month.
In the meantime, it’s buyer beware: read the labels and make sure you’re getting the whole grains the government says you should be getting.
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