12 Steps to Whole Foods

Replacing White Flour with Whole Grains
One of the virtues of whole wheat is that it’s easy to store. Those who opened King Tut’s tomb found wheat
still capable of sprouting. Wheat can last many years in sealed buckets or cans because of its hard, protective
exterior. When you break that outer layer, grinding it into flour, however, it begins to oxidize rapidly, becoming
rancid in a short period of time (a few weeks or months). I believe that many people who say they don’t like
things made with whole wheat actually mean that they don’t like the taste of things made from rancid grain,
since many things made with whole grains go rancid by the time the consumer eats them. When the oils in the
grain become rancid, they are carcinogenic, so you should avoid them for more reasons than just taste. An
electric grain grinder is a worthwhile investment, then, so you can grind your wheat just in time to use it.
Even some products being touted as “whole grain” in health food stores are not nutritious. For example, puffed
grains and many other cereal products, even though they are advertised as “whole grain,” are in fact harmful,
for a few reasons.
Most whole-grain granolas and cereals contain a high level of concentrated sweeteners, as well as harmful
refined oils, usually canola or soy oils. And virtually all of them contain toxic refined salt. Also, most contain
soy and corn products, which are America’s most genetically modified foods, and we should avoid them as
much as possible.
Finally, they are processed in other ways besides removing the germ and bran. A particular trend to begin
noticing and avoiding is the puffed grains that were documented in an unpublished study done by a cereal
company and documented by Paul Stitt. One group of rats received plain whole wheat, water, and synthetic
vitamins and minerals. A second group received puffed wheat (an “extruded” cereal), water, and the same
vitamins and minerals. A third set was given only water. A fourth was given only water and the vitamins and
minerals.
The rats that actually attained “longevity” were those eating only whole wheat. They lived over a year. The rats
on water and vitamins lived two months. Those on water alone lived a month. But the rats given vitamins,
water, and puffed wheat died within two weeks. It is unsurprising that the cereal company elected not to
publicize these findings.
Another experiment in the 1960s, designed as a joke at Ann Arbor University, fed 18 rats three different diets:
corn flakes, the cardboard box the cornflakes came in, and rat chow. The rat-chow group lived a long time. The
ones who ate cardboard got sick and died. But the cornflake-eating rats died first! Before they did, they
developed schizophrenia, became aggressive with each other, and had seizures.
The chemical changes resulting from pressure of the puffing and other processing apparently causes a
nutritious grain to become a toxic fuel. So, whole grains are not all made equal!
These trends in packaged foods, or what I call “feel-good health foods,” make it that much more important to
learn to use whole grains, freshly milled, in our own homes, where we can avoid the pitfalls of processed foods
masquerading as good nutrition.
© Copyright Robyn Openshaw 12 Steps to Whole Foods 247