In the last health column, we described what happened to whole wheat flour. As the milling industry tried to create flour with a longer shelf life, they ended up with using the least-nutritious part of the wheat kernel, the starchy part called endosperm. In the process they removed some of the known minerals and vitamins.
When nutritional deficiency diseases appeared some years later, the industry restored four of the nutrients and called the flour “enriched white four.”
Healthful bread
Truly healthful bread contains ground-up whole grains, with the bran, germ, and endosperm present. Such breads have double, triple, and in some cases quadruple nutrient value when compared with their refined counterparts.
When combined with fresh fruit, cereals, vegetables, potatoes, and beans, bread makes interesting and satisfying meals and helps support good energy levels for extended periods.
Look for the substantial-feeling, firm loaves that aren’t full of air. Look for 100 percent whole-wheat, stone-ground if possible. Sprouted-wheat breads are also excellent.
Find a reliable bakery. Better yet, make your own bread.
Whole-wheat flour attracts weevils
Whole-grain flours have a healthy balance of starch, protein, natural fats, and fiber besides being loaded with vitamins and minerals. The bugs seem to know this. White flour, on the other hand, is such a nutritional minus that the bugs are too smart to touch it.
Store whole-grain flours in your refrigerator or freezer. Or buy the grains whole and grind them up into flour just before using.
Isn’t bread fattening?
It isn’t the bread that’s fattening, but what we do with it. A slice of whole-wheat bread has 70 calories—no more than an apple. If slathered with peanut butter and jam, the slice can pack close to 300 calories. It’s not the raw materials but the overhead that can turn a low-calorie, nutritious, healthful slice of good bread into a caloric disaster.
Bread has traditionally been the backbone of human nutrition. Restoring good bread to its rightful place is a big step toward better health. Next time you shop for bread, go for the real staff of life, not that imitation bread—that stuff of lies.
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