Whole wheat sourdough bread is not necessarily healthier than industrial white bread

Scientists from the Weizmann Institute discovered that the body's response to eating bread varies from person to person, apparently due to the different composition of intestinal bacteria

According to a new study by researchers from the Weizmann Institute, health breads are not necessarily healthier than white bread for everyone. Source: pixabay.com.
According to a new study by researchers from the Weizmann Institute, health breads are not necessarily healthier than white bread for everyone. source: pixabay.com.

There is nothing like bread - if not in terms of taste, then at least in terms of its relative part in the diet. For many people in Israel, bread provides about a tenth of the daily calorie intake, more than any other food. In recent decades, white bread has gotten a bad name, while many bakeries compete with each other to create fine healthy wholemeal breads. However, before you stock up on rye, spelled or oat bread, you should know that according to a new study by Weizmann Institute scientists, which Recently published in the scientific journal Cell metabolism, these health breads are not necessarily healthier for everyone.

In order to examine the effects of different breads on health, the institute's scientists compared two types that, according to the popular perception, are on the two ends of the health spectrum. On the one hand, uniform bread - white industrial bread made from processed wheat, which is considered the least healthy; And on the other hand - bread that was created especially for the research and was supposed to have unique properties: the dough, which was prepared from whole wheat that was milled by hand, raised with sourdough and baked in a slow oven.

The 20 subjects who participated in the study were divided into two groups and were asked, for one week, to consume particularly large amounts of bread (amounts that provided about a quarter of the total daily calorie intake). One group ate white bread, and the other group - the "healthy" sourdough bread. After a two-week break, the groups switched: for another week, those who ate white bread now switched to sourdough bread and vice versa.

According to the tests conducted, eating a lot of bread, of any kind, affected the levels of sugar, minerals, liver enzymes and various other substances in the blood. But when the researchers compared the effects of the two types of bread, they were in for a surprise. "We were sure that the sourdough bread would turn out to be healthier, but to our great surprise, there was no difference between the two breads in terms of the effect on health," says Prof. Eran Segal From the Department of Computer Science and Applied Mathematics.

"The reason probably lies in the fact that the body's reaction to eating bread is a very personal matter, so the results in both groups balanced out on average," explains Dr. Eran Alinev from the Department of Immunology, who led the research with Prof. Segal and Prof. Avraham Levy from the Department of Plant and Environmental Sciences. Prof. Levy adds: "We designed the experiment so that people would consume the same amount of carbohydrates available from both types of bread. Since whole wheat bread has relatively fewer carbohydrates, the subjects ate larger amounts of it compared to the white bread. This difference in the amount of carbohydrates should also be taken into account when planning a diet."

It is possible that the subjects reacted differently, among other things, because of the difference in their gut bacteria. In those who reacted with high sugar levels to white bread, a different composition of intestinal bacteria was discovered than in those who reacted this way to sourdough bread

This is how the researchers discovered that in about half of the subjects, the blood sugar levels increased greatly after eating white bread, while in the other half, these levels increased especially after eating sourdough bread. It is possible that the subjects reacted differently, among other things, because of the difference in their gut bacteria. In those who reacted with high sugar levels to white bread, a different composition of intestinal bacteria was discovered than in those who reacted this way to sourdough bread.

The scientists even developed an algorithm that links the composition of the gut bacteria with the person's reaction to this or that type of bread. "We were able to predict, using the algorithm, in whom the sugar will rise after eating white bread, and in whom after eating sourdough bread," says Tal Korem, who carried out the research with Dr. David Zavi and other group members: Dr. Omer Weisbrod, Noam Bar , Maya Luten-Pompan, Dr. Tali Avnit Sagi, Noa Kosver, Gal Malka, Michal Rein and Dr. Adina Weinberger from the Department of Computer Science and Applied Mathematics; and Dr. Niv Zamora and Yotam Suez from the Department of Immunology.

Comments

  1. There is a huge difference - health-wise and biochemically - between industrial yeast bread and sourdough bread.
    [Yes, yes - my father claims that they are the same - read carefully]
    Below are sources:

    http://www.breadmatters.com/index.php?route=information%2Finformation&information_id=34

    https://eatwell.co.il/%D7%9C%D7%90%D7%9B%D7%95%D7%9C-%D7%A7%D7%9E%D7%97-%D7%95%D7%9C%D7%94%D7%99%D7%A9%D7%90%D7%A8-%D7%91%D7%A8%D7%99%D7%90/

    http://www.rambam-medicine.org.il/category/sourdough

  2. Alcohol and carbohydrates that break down quickly are poison.

    There is no such thing as "healthy bread" just like there are no healthy "potatoes" and just like there is no "healthy pasta". They all shorten life because the body accumulates excess sugar (or excess fat). The stories about healthy bread are lies sold to us by food manufacturers.

    It is allowed to consume only a necessary minimum of bread or other empty carbohydrates (this is when the body is in a state of lack of blood sugar). Everything else belongs in the trash can. With proper planning of buying bread, surpluses are not created, with bad planning by gluttons, surpluses are created - therefore throw in the trash and eliminate.

    Turning carbohydrates into alcohol is a nightmare because alcohol (beyond a minimal amount) destroys the body (mainly the liver but not only). The body does not have any metabolic mechanism that removes alcohol from the body without harm. The alcohol dissolves tissues and disrupts normal metabolism, do not touch this poison (let's say a maximum of 30 CC per day). Alcohol is addictive, brings no benefit to the body, only harm.

  3. This is so ridiculous.
    Obviously, white bread is less healthy.
    What is this nonsense, we gave both groups the same amount of calories, so it will probably have the same effect in terms of the increase in sugar. But it is clear that wholemeal bread is healthier even without checking the effect of the additional nutritional values, it has fewer calories and is more satisfying. They specifically write that the whole grain bread group ate more to compare the amount of calories.
    In short, maybe there is some benefit in research on understanding the activity of bacteria in the gut. But it is clear that the conclusion that emerges from the title is completely false.
    This is a title that is more suitable for Ynet than for a respected scientific website.

  4. This study, and following it the article, sound like a joke, and even like advertising on behalf of...
    Most of the things were recorded by my father, and I will only add that it has long been known that the intestinal bacteria know how to adapt to any type of food.
    So that by prolonged eating of a certain food the necessary bacteria multiply while the others decrease. This is also why it is difficult for the body to initially adapt to a new lifestyle. But the fact is that even people who lived for a long time on healthy food found it difficult to go back to living on normal food (if we call it that).

  5. Some notes:
    1. The sample of 90 is a very small sample, usually studies such as those carried out on hundreds or thousands of people, also the time is too short to discover changes in the health of the subjects, when comparing the benefit of dating on humans, it is usually about samples of large populations over many years .
    2. The differences between whole wheat bread and white bread are the fibers and vitamins of type B (mainly B1) found in the husk of the wheat. Everything else is supposed to be the same - the researchers were supposed to test the futility of the effect of the fibers, that is - faster digestion, faster absorption and removal of toxins and so on The benefits of dietary fiber.
    And in addition also symptoms related to vitamin B and its lack. Quoting from Wiki: "Exhaustion, irritability, memory defects, lack of appetite, sleep disturbances, upset stomach, weight loss, nausea, muscle pain, tremors in the limbs, decreased reflex speed and confusion. Vitamin B1 deficiency can cause beriberi disease." And excessive consumption may cause a deficiency in the other vitamins from group B. - None of these things were tested in the study.
    To remind you of the problematic issue of eating white bread, and as a result, vitamin B1 was also discovered because people and animals who were fed white rice or white bread got the disease called beriberi.
    3. In relation to sourdough - sourdough is in general the growth of natural yeast in flour that ferments instead of adding the ready-made yeast, we let the flour ferment (as our ancestors tried to do in the Exodus and they didn't have enough.) That is, let the yeast that is naturally present in the flour grow by itself - because yeast is a living thing, therefore There is no difference between yeast that is grown in a factory and sold dry and that which is found in flour, and in any case the yeast ends its role in creating the carbon dioxide that swells the dough (this is how the dough rises), and is destroyed by the heat of the oven, therefore in any case there is not and should not be any biochemical difference between bread made from sourdough and bread which is made of flour and yeast, so I am amazed at the researchers who even bothered to check this issue of sourdough bread versus yeast bread.

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