Ref weblink article: Ancient grain blend to plug gluten-free nutrition gap.
EXCERPTS:The gluten-free food market was worth almost $1.6bn last year, according to Packaged Facts, and saw a compound annual growth rate of 28 per cent over four years........But against this backdrop of popularity, there have been concerns that some gluten-free products on the market made with rice, corn and potato flour and xanthan or guar gum to improve texture have sub-optimal levels of essential nutrients........Even outside the gluten-free niche, ancient grains have been attracting attention amongst healthy eaters. While they have been staples for civilizations around the world for millennia, in the West, they have fallen off the menu in favour of wheat and barley.....
I had the chance & inclination to explore about the whole of this GLUTEN FREE food affair during my marketing assignment to market a Imported product range in India. During this, I studied & explored extensively; Also consulting-reading lots of write ups about ingredients used, there functionality, medical references etc.
Till now, this disease is hardly recognized by common public in India & majority of Doctors too.Though western world is suffering highly from this with incidents increasing rapidly. Also, the Interesting fact is that a very minuscule population suffers from this in India.The disease in patients is diagnosed after a lot of time & efforts wastage due to ignorance. A bigger market exists in North India particularly Punjab area which are traditional wheat eating areas in contrast to south India( rice areas) where Celiac is almost absent. The biggest customers turned out to be western NRI's who stayed for long abroad & returned back to India recently. This clearly indicates relation between GRAIN eating habits & Celiac. According to me ,the major culprit is Bread ( yeast intolerance too) which mostly is from refined wheat flour.
Once diagnosed with CELIAC they have no option but to stick to GLUTEN FREE diet which is mostly only available in form of ready costly products.
The findings were astonishing & very interesting. The whole subject is not as complex as it is hyped to be in the western world or by large companies. It is really related to human ignorance about eating right food in the modern world till CELIAC cropped up & solutions were sought for.
What has happened is that excessive focus on some crops ( Wheat, Corn etc) which have gluten has been made in Agriculture in the past century & subsequently food made further from it. In quest for modernity, people abandoned eating traditional foods & Multiple Grains. Moreover Meats, fast & processed refined foods with little use of vegetables & fruits in diet added to natural food imbalance in the human body.
Even in India educated & well off mass considered eating Coarse grains as POOR MEN"S food. Wheat & Rice came in vogue widely. There is hardly any awareness about importance of other grains in the total diet mix. Amaranth balls made with jaggery find selling place in poor areas except during Fasting times when they are consumed more for religious reasons.
In Indian religions & customs FASTING has a very big importance on various religious occasions which are frequent & many. A custom of having FALAAHAR fast is still very popular in which one is not supposed to use Salt, Grains, Onion, Garlic, Meats , Eggs etc. Alternate food like Root vegetables, fruits,curd, Milk & Amaranth-Buckwheat-Sago etc are used extensively. This act as a break from normal food & simultaneously provides body with other nutrients which we ignore in our routine daily eating.
Sorghum & Millet which are in abundance are hardly used for human food & much of it goes as animal fodder.
Therefore, it would not be wrong to say that changing our eating habits FUNDAMENTALLY right from childhood : Eating lot of variety,changing ingredients used in our daily food rapidly, Increasing variety of grains-Fruits - vegetables is the safest & healthiest way to take us back to health & close to nature as well. This is the only way to even prevent CELIAC.
Otherwise there is no way except to fall in more High-tech jargon & pay through nose for products to large companies making our lives more complex.
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