“How frequently do you eat bread?” is a common question I ask my clients while taking their diet recall. And here is the common answer I get- “not that much, but whenever I eat, it is always the brown one.” Or “yes every week but now I eat only brown bread”. They also tell me how they were white bread eaters for so long but now they have replaced it with the brown or whole wheat one.
When we are switching over to a healthier choice of the foods, switching from white bread to brown bread is the most obvious choice. Most of you probably think that switching over brown bread from white one is definitely a healthy move. But the truth is that it is not necessarily healthy.
I had done a small market survey regarding brown breads. I bought a few brands of brown bread and checked their ingredients. And what I found is that the bread from commercial brands that we get in the market is just a plain white bread with added brown color in it, which is obviously not healthy. Since I also make breads at home, the peculiar quality of refined flour (maida) makes the bread light and airy. If I have to make it a whole wheat one, I’ll need to add extra leavening agents or sodas to make it palatable. So even if you buy pure whole wheat bread it is not necessarily all that healthy as you are gulping down extra amounts of leavening agents with it.
It is not that you don’t have access to healthy breads at all. There are small scale manufactures who make fresh authentic whole wheat or multigrain bread in a healthy manner, so you can buy from them if you are sure about the source.
Either the brown bread or the white breads not completely bad for your health. Since both the breads contain baking soda, salts, fat and leavening agents, one should avoid bread rather than substituting one for the other.
I welcome comments and queries in the comment section, so let’s have a conversation!