IS THE BROWN BREAD YOU ARE CONSUMING THE REAL HEALTH DEAL?

With an increasing consciousness about health and hygiene, a large number of consumers are making the switch from white bread to brown bread or whole wheat bread at their breakfast tables. However, there is little awareness about why is brown bread considered healthy or what constitutes brown bread that makes it healthy. As a result, most people succumb to marketing tactics of companies that add caramel to white bread to make the color brown and advertise it as wholesome and tasty!

In some extremely lazy manufacturing, but inspired marketing, much of the ‘brown’ bread you’ll find in the supermarket is simply the same white bread with brown coloring, often CARAMEL, added back into it. Hardly the healthier choice it’s made out to be.
Likewise, ‘wholemeal’ bread with a bit of chemically treated wheat germ added back in, or ‘multigrain’, with a sprinkling of softened grains, hardly makes up for what the main ingredient – refined wheat flour – has gone through.
The fact is, the vast majority of breads from the big manufacturers are just slight variations, a little coloring here, a sprinkling of seeds there, of the same extremely unhealthy processed bread.
But the hullaballoo of wanting to eat brown bread as the healthy bread could all be distorted in kenya! This is because almost 80% of brown bread sold to us is not genuinely brown. The best bread to eat is the whole wheat grain bread that you can find in supermarkets and normally has a darker colour and is more expensive!
True whole wheat bread, if you can find it, should be a healthier option. Whole wheat bread is made with the wheat germ and the bran included and is hopefully not as heavily processed or full of chemical additives as most commercial loaves. It’s higher fiber content helps to slow down its digestion and therefore its effect on your blood sugar and levels of fat storing insulin shouldn’t be as pronounced.
A real brown bread is healthier than white bread because the wheat flour used to make brown bread is less processed compared to wheat flour used for making white bread. During the processing of the wheat flour for making brown bread the bran and germ in the wheat grain are not removed. The bran is the part of wheat grain that is rich in fibre, while germ is the inner part of wheat grain which is packed with nutrients, Vitamins B and E as well as phytochemicals.

So how do you tell the REALS from the FAKES?
It's commonly believed that you can tell the difference between white and wholemeal by the color of the loaf. Not so! The keywords to look out for are "whole grain" and "whole wheat" as the first ingredient on the ingredient list. If any other substance is listed first, you are likely looking at white bread that has had caramel colouring added.
There you have it, find this rare Whole meal bread and find your long lost and found real brown bread. Infact, ask yourself why you eat brown chapattis that taste real brown but when you eat brown bread it does not have similar taste?

This is not to say that white and brown breads could be exactly the same in Kenya market. If you compare the labels of white and brown breads of your favourite brand, you will probably find that the brown bread still has more dietary fiber, making it the wiser choice. What’s important to remember is not to confuse all brown breads with the much healthier whole grain bread alternatives. Do your research and read your labels for the choice that’s right for you. Best place to begin is in Tuskys supermarket at the bread parlour where you will spot the difference!
I know you have questions so comment below and email me on ndutaniceness@gmail.com

White or Brown Sugar?

Do you find yourself paying more for brown sugar than the “regular” white sugar? Have you ever wondered which is healthier for you?

In order to answer, let’s explain how sugar is manufactured. Yes, although it comes from sugar canes or beets, sugar does go through quite a bit of processing before we see it in its final form on supermarket shelves.


What you need to know:
The raw materials utilized are either sugar cane stalks or sugar beet (a root). Let’s talk sugar cane today:

1. After the sugar cane stalks are harvested, they are chopped into small pieces
2. The stalk pieces are pulverized in order to release the sugary cane juice.
3. the juice usually has some impurities in it such as mud, pieces of stalk and other stuff, so it is filtered using both mechanical and chemical processes (using  polyacrylamides).
4.  The purified liquid is boiled until the water evaporates.
5. The remaining “juice” is heated once again and the sugar begins to crystallize. A side product that is left over is called mother liquor (it is the source of molasses)
6. A centrifuge is used to separate individual sugar crystals.

 The result is raw sugar. The crystals are relatively large and have a brownish tinge to them. Stay tuned folks, this is NOT brown sugar.

Raw sugar is shipped to a refinery for further processing to create the white sugar that we know:

1. The raw sugar is heated and melts into a liquid again.
2. The coloration is removed by using chemicals such as phosphoric acid and calcium hydroxide or calcium dioxide.
3. The liquid is boiled one last time in order concentrate it into the fine white granulated crystals that make up white sugar, or refined sugar.

 White and brown sugar are similar in calorie content, with 1/4 cup of white sugar containing 194 calories and 1/4 cup of packed brown sugar containing 209 calories. All of the calories in white sugar come from carbohydrates, of which there is 50 g. There are three types of carbohydrates: fiber, starch and sugar. All 50 g of these carbohydrates is sugar, all of which is in the form of sucrose. Nearly all of the calories in brown sugar come from carbohydrates as well, although one serving does contain 0.07 g of protein. However, this protein accounts for less than 1 of the 209 calories per serving. One serving of brown sugar contains 54 g of carbohydrates, nearly all of which are sugar. Brown sugar is primarily sucrose, although the added molasses provides small amounts, less than 1 g, of glucose and fructose.

Okay so sugar ought not to be a paramount thing in our diet and yes insignificance of nutrients in both sugars is not something to dwell on...But look at these trait comparisons...

TRAITS	BROWN/ SUGAR	ORDINARY WHITE SUGAR
Physical Appearance	Yellowish-brown sugar in the rich aroma of tropical sugarcane.	No flavor, taste, or color from natural sources.
Production Process	Produced by a precise co-crystallization process to retain natural flavor & color components.	Ordinary sugar manufacture process employs several chemicals.
Chemical Additives	At no stage in the production process, are any chemical additives added. It is free from any harmful chemicals like phosphoric acid, formic acid, sulfur dioxide, preservatives/bleaching agents. This results in a health-friendly and chemical-free sugar.	Processing involves a potpourri of chemicals; all finally showing their impact on our health in the long run. Sulfur carryover puts health at stake.
Nutrition Content	Apart from a pure and natural sweetness, it contains 187 mg calcium, 56 mg phosphorous, 4.8mg iron, 757 mg potassium, and 97 mg sodium per cup of sugar-all from natural sources.	Does not contain natural minerals.

Now, this makes brown sugar the safest bet in Kenyan market!

LOOK OUT NEXT TIME!

Nduta 

Nutrition Counsellor