I was a kid in the 1960’s. Television was still a new novelty and even though our shows were broadcast in black and white, we still could identify the packages of “Wonder Bread” the bread that “Builds Strong Bodies 12 ways”. I never knew that in the 1950’s, the commercials claimed that “Wonder Bread Builds Strong Bodies 8 ways” What happened? Where did the 4 new ways come from?
Turns out that someone built a better mousetrap… or so it appeared at the time.
In the 1950’s, there were wheat fields and grains. The grains were tall and the wheat grew well - but while it had more vitamins and minerals, it had less protein. Ours was a country suffering from poor nutrition and when the winds blew, it often knocked down the tall grain stalks making a rough situation worse.
But then came the 1060s and the genetic scientists. In a well meaning effort to feed more people a grain with greater nutrition, botanists were able to create a whole new wheat. It was a shorter plant so it was less resistant to wind damage. It had a larger head with a greater yield of grain and much higher protein. It could “Build Strong Bodies 12 Ways”.
Understand, this wasn’t just a new strain. This was whole new “thing”. While the wheat of the 50’s had 28 chromosomes, this modern wheat now had 42 chromosomes.
So what could possibly go wrong with that? Let me give you these 2 paragraphs from an Oct 18, 2012 article by Mark Sisson titled “ The Problems with Modern Wheat”
So what’s the deal with modern wheat? Well, celiac disease is on the rise, and some researchers have suggested that this is caused by the prevalence of certain gluten proteins that predominate in the new varieties of wheat. Namely, a gluten peptide known as glia-?9, which is nearly absent in older wheats but prevalent in modern wheats, is the most reactive “CD (celiac disease) epitope.” In other words, a majority of people with celiac disease react negatively to glia-?9. It’s a common trigger, and older wheat doesn’t have as much of it.
Meanwhile, einkorn, an ancient variety of wheat, has been shown to cause less intestinal toxicity in patients with celiac. Einkorn and other related ancient strains of wheat still contain gluten, of course, but they do not appear to be as damaging to people sensitive to or completely intolerant of gluten and its related protein subfractions..
So what’s the message here? We’re still gathering data here at the farm - but it appears that people who are having trouble with the modern wheat (bloating, gas, abdominal pain, celiac symptoms, etc.) are able to handle the ancient grains (Einkorn, amaranth, teff, emmer ferro, spelt and others) with no negative symptoms. We will keep working with our clients to see if this bears out but the evidence is rapidly growing.
If you try the ancient grains and have a similar reaction (or, in so many cases, a similar NON-reaction), please let us know. We think you may be part of a growing trend…