Gluten-Free
At the start of the new millennium, carbs was the nutrient
everyone loved to hate. It got blamed for everything - from weight gain, acne
to even cancer. If something bad happened to you, it could somehow be traced
back to the bread and rice you’d been eating. Popular celebrity diets like
Atkins and the Zone – made famous by celebs like Renee Zellweger & Jennifer
Aniston – didn’t help to put the public’s mind at ease either. Rather, it
fostered a love-hate relationship with the nutrient that has transcended time.
Yes, it may not look exactly the same but our disdain for the idea of eating
carbs is still clearly evident when we see the latest villain in town:
gluten. Although it’s a protein, its
mainly found in wheat barley and rye – in other words, carb foods. Gluten-free products have been on the rise.
Sales of gluten-free products have increased from $4.8 billion to $6.1 billion
from 2009 to 2011, jumping by 27 percent (SPINS, 2012). Yes, carb-hate is here
to stay. But does gluten really deserve all this bad press? Not unless you have
celiac disease or gluten sensitivity which result in diarrhea or migraines when
you ingest this protein. Otherwise, its just a lot of money down the drain as
gluten-free products can be quite expensive. And as with the previously
mentioned label buzz words, gluten-free doesn’t always mean its going to help
you lose weight or is even healthier. To compensate for the lack of gluten (it
helps give processed foods its spongy and stretchy texture, as well as thicken
sauces and soups), these products are usually reinforced with more calories,
fat, starch and sugar to make them more appetizing. They are also lower in
fibre and lack the vitamin enrichment such as iron and B vitamins that gluten
containing products have. So unless gluten gives you a bad vibe, I suggest you
steer clear of these products.
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