ZOE Science & Nutrition - Can bread be healthy?

Starting point is 00:00:00 Welcome to ZOE Science and Nutrition, where world-leading scientists explain how their research can improve your health. It is no exaggeration to say that bread created modern humanity. Archaeologists in the Middle East have found fossilized breadcrumbs from over 14,000 years ago. It was the cultivation of wheat for flour that transformed our ancestors, from hunter-gatherers to city dwellers. Today, millions of us start the day with a slice of toast, and most lunches in the US and UK are wrapped in a slice of bread or a burger bun. As a cheap, flexible and delicious energy source, this is no surprise. But bread is

Starting point is 00:00:48 not what it once was. Modern industrial processes designed to reduce the time and cost of baking mean that today's bread would be unrecognizable to our ancestors. These processes were invented with the best of intentions, as growing populations meant more mouths to feed. But this technological progress has a cost. Today's bread resembles a sugary drink. It tastes good, it looks good on the outside, but it has lost most of its nutritional content. With most of its fibre gone,

Starting point is 00:01:24 and no time for bacteria to work its fermenting magic, bread has become a simple starch rapidly turned into sugar in our blood and offering little to support our gut bacteria. For this reason bread is increasingly demonized as an evil carb. So in today's episode we're finding out if bread can ever be healthy, which types are better than others, and what to look out for when doing your grocery shopping. You'll also hear a bombshell about and specialist in the subject of bread nutrition and digestibility, and Tim Spector, one of the world's top 100 most cited scientists and my scientific co-founder at Zoe. Vanessa and Tim, thank you for joining me today. As usual, why don't we start with a quick fire round of questions from our listeners.

Starting point is 00:02:23 So starting with Tim, can bread be part of a healthy diet? Absolutely it can, yes, but perhaps not for everybody and not all the time. Bread contains gluten. Is gluten bad for most people? Gluten is not bad for most people. Definitely bad for 1% of the population. And people think they have a problem with gluten than really do. Brilliant. And last one for Tim. Is sourdough bread healthy?

Starting point is 00:02:55 It depends how you make it. So good sourdough bread is healthy for most people. Bad sourdough bread is probably as unhealthy as other breads. So Vanessa, are all breads made in roughly the same way? No, absolutely not. There's an extreme difference between different processes of making bread. Is all sourdough bread the same, however? No, even more confusing. I think we'll be coming back to that then. Is there live

Starting point is 00:03:26 bacteria in sourdough bread in the way that there is in yoghurt? There should be if it's made correctly. All right. Is there a common misconception about bread that makes you annoyed or laugh? Yes, I get really cross when people blame gluten for everything. Gluten bashing. I often shout at my Instagram feed when I see dietitians and nutritionists saying, avoid gluten without the full facts. And I can look like the mad pigeon lady in the park, sort of yelling at the screen because it frustrates me immensely the amount of misinformation about bread that is out there. Well, why don't we start with why bread matters? And Tim, why is bread important? It's been demonized as sort of the ultimate evil carb. What's the truth about how

Starting point is 00:04:20 it affects our health? I'd like to share something exciting. Back in March 2022, we started this podcast to uncover how the latest research can help us live longer and healthier lives. We've spoken to leading scientists around the world doing amazing research. And across hundreds of hours of conversations, they've revealed key insights that can help you to improve your health. If you don't have hundreds of hours to spare, no need to worry. At the request of many of you, our team has created a guide that contains 10 of the most impactful discoveries from the podcast that you can apply to your life. And you can get it for free. Simply go to zoe.com slash free guide, or click the link in the show notes. And do let me know what you think of it. Okay, back to zoe.com slash free guide or click the link in the show notes and do let me know

Starting point is 00:05:07 what you think of it okay back to the show what's important about bread is how much a part of our staple diet it is so its importance is in the percentage it makes up of all our energy and all our meals. 80% of British people have a sandwich for their lunch. And that has only happened since the 1980s. So just that mere fact alone means that the choice of bread has a crucial impact on large parts of our diet, which perhaps it didn't quite have 50 years ago. So I think that's the importance. And for many people, it can be the only source of fiber. And it's crucial, therefore, that we understand bread and we try to work out the different kinds of good breads and bad breads and realize that there's a huge range. And so your choice of not only

Starting point is 00:06:05 when to eat bread, but also what type of bread to eat are absolutely crucial to our health. And I think a lot of our listeners asked whether bread was basically empty calories. They feel that it makes them put on weight. I think they're coming at this as an assumption that the bread is not a very good part of our diet and there's many better things that we could be eating. Where are you on that? Well, I think if you mainly bread, that would be true. And a lot of people do eat mainly bread. People who have crisp sandwiches or basically have it three times a day in its worst, cheapest form are having a very poor diet indeed. And this is because that sort of bread is ultra-processed and very cheap and has replaced traditional types of breads in the last few years. But even so,

Starting point is 00:06:54 it's got good and bad sides to it. So white bread is used really as a substitute for lots of experiments of, say, sugar about how you get sugar quickly into the blood system. And it scores 100 out of 100 on many tests of the availability of sugar in food, because it is quite so available, that starch. And Tim, can you explain, I'm not sure that everyone will have followed that, how does the bread and sugar seem like two very different things? Could you just unpack that for a minute? Yes. So people don't think of bread as a source of sugar, but carbohydrates, of which sugars

Starting point is 00:07:31 are one part, another part are called starches, which are stored sugars. And in many types of bread, common white breads, that starch is released as sugar very quickly in the system. And the common supermarket white breads are classical in that your body will very quickly start breaking them down and that starch gets released as sugar and appears in your blood in 30 minutes at very high levels. And so it's used in a way as a gold standard of saying this is the glucose response to sugar. Just quoting as an example that people don't often think of bread as a form of sugar. So on the one hand, it's a form of sugar, but it's also a form of fiber. And so there are parts of

Starting point is 00:08:18 bread that don't get broken down, digested, that do reach the lower colon and the lower part of the intestine and are helpful to the microbes. So depending on that mixture between the carbohydrates, the starch, which produce the sugar, and what proportion that is compared to the good bits, the fiber, determines very often how healthy or unhealthy that bread is in very broad terms. Got it. And we're going to talk with Vanessa, I think, a lot now about sort of how that bread really works. I have to say as a personal anecdote, as someone who discovered that they have really bad blood sugar control, the first time that I wore a blood sugar sensor on my arm, one of the first things I noticed was this enormous spike that I was having with bread,

Starting point is 00:09:03 which I love. So this was a bit of a shock. And, you know, one of the consequences of changing my diet was over the last few years is a big shift about when and how I eat bread. And I've definitely noticed that not only did I lose some of this spike, but I've noticed that some of the energy crashes that I used to get after breakfast are definitely lower. It's definitely helped me in terms of thinking about weight. So, you know, there's definitely at a personal level, Vanessa, I've definitely noticed that perhaps the way I used to eat bread was not the best way for me, which I think is a great segue into like, what really is bread? So we've already sort of shown that there's quite a lot

Starting point is 00:09:39 of complexity. Could you help us to understand what it is? And in today's world, what is this process by which it ends up in all the stores and the chains where most of us buy our bread and our pre-prepared sandwiches and our McDonald's and all the rest of it that you would recognize as being the bread in the supermarket. So even going as far back as Neolithic man, and there are some studies that even indicate from archaeobotany, meaning archaeologists finding evidence, that even 100,000 years ago, we were actually grinding up sugrient in caves, indicating that these initial breads would have been made into kind of patties and they would have started to ferment and I guess they were easy to carry around almost like biscuits if you look at the evidence of them and then we started to evolve into hunter gatherers evolving into more agricultural practices we started growing grains and harvesting them and actually consciously making them into breads and then time went on and you can find

Starting point is 00:10:54 evidence from the Egyptians who made bread and beer often beer is called liquid bread bread. And we have always eaten bread, but not anything like the plastic, wrapped, white, nutritional, devoid things that we buy in the supermarket. So what does that mean? How is a normal bread made? And how is it even possible for this to be done in this different way? This all happened one tiny little bit at a time to progress. So the first thing is, is that we had a mass change in population. People started coming to cities and we started having to make bread a lot more. Now, we actually, very interestingly at that time, we went from stone ground flour where the grain is whole and interestingly enough you're talking about your blood sugar rising when your grain is still whole and actually bound to those bran

Starting point is 00:11:51 and fiber that has a much slower rate of assimilation of carbohydrate because it's still actually part of the original whole grain but what we did is we began roller milling it and breaking away the fiber from the starch, as Tim says, the sugar. And that meant that a lot of the bran, even when you use it as whole grain, is broken away from the starch. And Vanessa, because you've used the word bran, can you just help us to understand what exactly that is? So essentially, we're eating seeds and the outer husk on the seed is protective. It stops insects from eating it. It stops UV radiation, but it contains all of the goodness that we need to nourish our microbes in our gut. It contains the minerals, the vitamins, the polyphenols, which are antioxidants.

Starting point is 00:12:47 Again, really all the goodness is in the bran. And we created a process that splits it away from the endosperm, which is the starch, and we created white flour. And Vanessa, can you help your listeners and help me as well to understand a bit more what that means? So like, what is the difference between spelt or rye or flour? Like I remember having when I was growing up and cooking something with my mum. Could you explain like, what's the difference between these things? Help us understand a little bit about that and then explore this idea of like mixing it all together as our ancestors did? We as bakers are given the most incredible range of flours to bake with, from einkorn, which is the first ever grain, which is sweet and nutty, spelt again, lovely and nutty, coristan, which is golden and full of selenium and carotenoids, which are, you know, incredibly nutritious as well.

Starting point is 00:13:45 We've got this sweetie shop of ingredients, barley, oats, rye, and my goodness me, you know, ladies and gentlemen, let's mix it up a little. You know, if we're going to make bread, we should really be thinking about involving the entire orchestra when it comes to our breads. And these are completely different plants. Is that right, Vanessa? Is that the right way to think about them? They're all grain. They're all grains. And they all have different attributes and flavors. And each one of them has got what we call different phytochemicals. And the different phytochemicals are what feed the different microbes in your gut. And therefore, if you eat that wonderful wide diversity, your gut microbes are having a party. They're like, oh, yay.

Starting point is 00:14:36 Yeah. The other thing to mention is that we're talking about diversity of these whole grains, but the modern breads are not whole grains in general. They are the pure inner part of it, and all the nutritious bit is taken off. So we've lost two parts of this. We've stripped the grain of all the good stuff and only taken the starchy, sugary bit, and we've lost this amazing diversity. So it's a double whammy of the breads that 90% of the people eat most of the time. And so Tim, what does that mean when it's arriving in our gut and for our microbes? What's the net result? You touched, I think, on the blood sugar impact, but what does it mean for our microbes and I guess our broader health, this whole process that Vanessa has been describing?

Starting point is 00:15:20 Well, it's changing the sugar to fiber ratio, as I said. So the breads that may look healthy often dyed brown to make them look healthier and whole grain, a few seeds on the outside, but the inside is still very starchy, very sugary, gives not only the sugar rush when you eat it, but it doesn't have anything like the good complexity of fiber that's going to, A, reach your gut, and then when it does, isn't going to nourish nearly as many gut microbes. So you're not going to get hardly any of the benefits that you would have got with the more diverse, more complex fibers that would feed many more microbes and keep them happy. And those microbes would be converting this fiber into other

Starting point is 00:16:06 healthy chemicals, which are really good for your immune system and your metabolism, etc. So it's that twofold difference that probably both impact our gut microbes. One, directly affecting metabolism, making you hungrier, faster, more tired, with that sugar spike, and then the lack of really good high quality fiber that's actually getting to your gut a while later and those two things are having a big impact and it's that ratio and that's the thing you can actually see if you are lucky enough to get a bread that tells you what's in it which most don't you can look at that ratio of the amount of fiber compared to the amount of the sugar content. And that's a good guide to whether that bread is going to likely to be of any health benefit to you or

Starting point is 00:16:52 not. And many of them are not. Even the Farol baguette, we all like a French baguette, but it does very poorly in that ratio. The other point to make here is that most of the bread we eat now and we buy in supermarkets is ultra-processed. And this is because it contains ingredients you can't find in your kitchen yourself. Often they have more than 10 ingredients, whereas anyone who makes bread, sourdough bread themselves, know it's got flour, water, and microbes, maybe some salt. And this effect of all these extra emulsifiers, these other additives, sometimes it contains some artificial sweeteners. All these have effects on your gut microbes that we're beginning to find out are negative.

Starting point is 00:17:38 And so the other hidden side of this is the whole process that keeps this bread looking fresh for two weeks. It means that it has negative effects on your gut microbes when it finally gets there. So many reasons. And so if our listener is going into a store and buying bread, Vanessa, because let's assume that not everybody is baking their own bread. I know we're going to touch on that, but imagine they go into the store or buying it online as I do. What are they looking for to understand the difference therefore between a good bread and a less good bread, both I guess in terms of that impact on the blood sugar, Tim, that you were talking about, as well as the microbes? How can

Starting point is 00:18:15 I figure that out? Right. So let's start with the first thing of changing attitude. If you were buying a bottle of wine, you'd look at the label, wouldn't you? You'd look at where the grapes came from. You'd maybe read a little bit about the grower. I know Tim would. Treat your bread like red wine. You would ask questions. We are assuming that the bread that we're buying is nourishing. We have to stop and look at it and look at the label. So that's your first thing. Never pick up a bread without looking at the label and turning it over. Look at the list of ingredients now. The second you see an extremely long list of things you cannot pronounce or you do not recognize, put it down. It doesn't matter what the label says on the front, put it back. Be prepared to put that bread back on the shelf and say, no, I am not

Starting point is 00:19:03 accepting this bread today. I want something that is going to nourish me. on the shelf and say, no, I am not accepting this bread today. I want something that is going to nourish me. I'm not feeding myself. I'm nourishing myself. So that is about changing your attitude. Then you need to look out for the simplest of ingredients. Let's start with flour, water, salt. But the thing that I get really excited about is actually the level of fiber and the proportion of fiber on the label. So I tend to, if I have to buy bread in the supermarket, I tend to look for anything above six grams per hundred grams minimum. What would be the sort of breads that you'd be advising listeners to try if they're starting out on this journey? Oh, the handsomest, sexiest one, no, the one with the

Starting point is 00:19:40 label that's looking for whole grain. I'd be looking for the words whole grain. But even then, there are problems that, as Tim mentioned, that some people can fake it. You know, it looks like it could be good. That's why I'm saying you need to get in a relationship with your bread and dig a little deeper. Find out a little bit more about it because they can fake that whole grain-ness. And a few extra tips and tricks here so words like granary mean nothing and malted loaf is actually just adding probably more sugar to it and so there's lots of ways that you're being fooled when you buy bread and so if there is a label try to look at the carbohydrate to fiber ratio and that should be relatively low so it should be around four or five to one

Starting point is 00:20:26 for a decent loaf. The worst kind of supermarket bread is about 17, 20 to one ratio. So there's a huge difference in that. Now, beware though, that in many supermarkets, that smell of bread hits you as you go around the aisle. And those breads they make on the premises don't have a label and they just put them in bags and you've got no real idea what's in them. And it's all a big con because that bread is often a year old. Oh, really? I was going to say, it sounds good. They made the bread in the premises.

Starting point is 00:20:57 Surely this is the best stuff, no? No, it's pre-frozen, it's pre-cooked and basically they just have to defrost it and give it a final toasting. And that's how they get away with making it this so-called fresh, you know, baked on the premises. And it means they also don't have to put a label on it, they don't have to say what additives they put in it, and it's all a giant con. But it does smell nice and makes you extra hungry as you're going around the supermarket. What about the gluten? You mentioned it right at the beginning. I think there's a lot of people

Starting point is 00:21:28 who are concerned about being sensitive to gluten. Bread is the number one thing that people associate with this. How should people think about this? Well, 1% of people, one in 100, actually have a real sensitivity or analogy to gluten. And these people have celiac disease, and it's a relatively common, if you think one in a hundred is common, autoimmune condition that this doesn't apply to. They will be vomiting, they'll feel really sick, won't be able to gain weight. There's no in-between area there. But recently in the last 20 years, we've seen this massive increase in gluten sensitivity, which is people that don't have the antibodies, they're not physically sick,

Starting point is 00:22:12 they just might feel bloating or other symptoms when they feel that they're eating gluten. And this percentage is going up all the time. And it's latest surveys around 10% of people say they have gluten sensitivity. When these people are actually tested blind with, say, gluten-free pasta or gluten pasta, and they're not told which is which, about 80% of them turn out not to be gluten sensitive. They have just got it wrong, or they've just made a mistake because the gluten is associated with other foods. So there's a whole group of people that are mistaken that it's gluten that's causing their problem.

Starting point is 00:22:49 There are still some people that do have a sensitivity to it, and they may well have other conditions like irritable bowel syndrome or other allergies, which have increased dramatically in the last few years, but may just be a general symptom of their problem rather than the cause of the problem. And that's, I think, where most of the scientists and doctors in this field are coming from, that no one really believes that gluten is causing these problems other than for the celiac. It is just a sign that people eating gluten-type foods or maybe cheap sandwiches or other things that contain it, they're eating other things along it that are giving them bad microbes. The worse your state of your microbes, the less you're able to, in a way, deal with some of the foods we eat.

Starting point is 00:23:38 This is a bit of a symptom of the Western gut. But as I said, most people are actually mistaken and they're not intolerant of gluten when they're tested in a scientific way. I think that's very important to realize. If we've cleared that up, Vanessa, can you clear up the sourdough mystery for us? So it's almost impossible now for me not to buy some bread that says sourdough on it. I'm still a bit unclear though, really what it is. Could you help us to understand and maybe Tim can help us understand if you know there's really the health benefits associated with this as well. So I'm currently finishing my doctorate in nutrition and digestibility

Starting point is 00:24:17 of bread. Most of my work for the past 20 years has been combining the potential health benefits of sourdough and long slow fermentation with that understanding of how that plays with the gut and the microbes in the gut and the impact on mental health. So the first thing to say is sourdough is a combination of wild yeast, that's yeast that's in the air and yeast that you capture, and lactic acid bacteria. Now you'll be familiar with these bacteria because you will have come across them in yogurt, you'll come across them in vinegar. These are chocolate, even coffee and tea is fermented, cheese is fermented. very, very familiar with these microbes. And we know that what they actually do is they feast on the available sugars. And there's a symbiotic relationship with the yeast. And they produce two types of acid. Now, the first type of acid is lactic acid. That is kind of a yogurty flavor.

Starting point is 00:25:21 And the other acid is acetic acid. and that's more what you would recognize as being vinegar and when you combine these different acids what actually happens is the acidity triggers this incredible change that goes on and transforms the dough that's not the acidity that actually on its own transforms the dough it's part of the equation because of course when you put acid on anything is going to break it down which is one part of it but the other part of the equation because of course when you put acid on anything it's going to break it down which is one part of it but the other part of it is very interesting and that is they trigger this amazing thing that's already in the grain and that is enzymes now if you think of enzymes as being like edward scissorhands they chop everything. And this ability to chop everything up is actually one

Starting point is 00:26:07 of the key things that, for example, changes the way that the flour is structured and the way that the dough behaves. So a really nice example is phytic acid. Now, when you get the acidity, it triggers the phytase and the phytase enzymes break down something that normally takes the minerals and the vitamins out with it. Also, phytase is something that can also give you wind. Never desirable for my bread, I feel, Vanessa. No, no. So one of the things that allows people to eat sourdough is that long, slow fermentation and those enzymes neutralize the phytic acid, making it easier to digest, but also unlocking the minerals, making it more nutritious. So I think that's a win-win. And how long does this process take? You're describing this long,

Starting point is 00:27:06 slow fermentation with wild yeast. How does that happen? And can that only happen if I'm sort of doing this at home or in some sort of artisanal bakery? In which case, is this relevant for large-scale feeding of people? So it's not just the length of fermentation, you are correct. you can ferment a sourdough in a very short space of time you can make them in six or eight hours or you can leave them longer but because of this chain reaction we tend to think of the longer you ferment it the more broken down it becomes. So if you have digestive issues, then fermenting overnight, which is called a retarded method, will generally break the flour down more, making it more nutritious, easier to digest,

Starting point is 00:27:54 and is an all-round healthier bread than, say, something that was short fermented. So within the process of fermentation, there are short ferments and long ferments, but it is using that live bacteria that transforms the dough. Just to clarify, you might have got the impression it's really complicated, Jonathan, but actually... It sounded really, really complicated to me, yes. But actually, Vanessa has actually written a book about how to do this really, really quickly, the 10-minute approach, that if you've got everything ready, it just takes you a few minutes to put everything together because the microbes do the work. Give me the 10-minute one. I think you scared me a bit, to be honest. I was getting a bit excited and now I'm retreating. Give me the-

Starting point is 00:28:40 Well, I now do this following you know, following Vanessa's coaching. And you keep a mother in the fridge. And from the old, you just keep recycling a bit of the old dough with the microbes in it. It's resting in the fridge. You mix it with some flour and some water. And then that takes you, you know, five minutes. And then you come back the next day. And then you add it more flour and more water to make up half a kilo.

Starting point is 00:29:08 And then you leave it to rise. Then you put it in the oven. Then you eat it. And really, that's it. The work is done for you by the microbes. And this is why if you've got a regular schedule, now people are working out, it's dead easy to do this. And you can just mix

Starting point is 00:29:25 in anything you really want to into that flour. And so regardless of all the chemistry behind it, actually, everyone can do this. And this is what everyone used to do before 1963, when we all got converted into plastic bread. So that's really important to realize. And I think it has said health benefits. And there are studies showing that people with celiac disease who would normally be vomiting with bread, many of them, not all, but some of them, when they have sourdough bread, actually were able to tolerate it, which is really interesting because it means that the protein in the sourdough bread is very different to normal breads. And the bit that's triggering these reactions is very much less. So gluten's still there, but the way it's presented is

Starting point is 00:30:11 different. Tim, you're absolutely right. Your own research actually showed that sending out mothers to all parts of the world and getting people to make their own mother, because you have to start it somewhere. So everyone leaves a bit of water and flour on the side of their sink, and then the natural yeast and bacteria flood in. And it turns out that when you do that, they're all very different and it makes your bread actually all very different. So all the starters around the world are all slightly different, which is a nice story about how all our guts are different. And so it's this amazing uniqueness of all these methods that are really important. And some of that, it turns out, is partly because the microbes on our hands are all

Starting point is 00:30:54 very different as well. So not only the microbes in the air in our room are all different, but when bakers get around and they start moving, it becomes a bit of a hybrid between your own body's microbes and what's in the dough and in the air as well. So that's why everyone's starter is unique and people often swap them around to get very different tastes and flavors because, as we know, microbes plus food gives you all these different chemicals in totally unique ways. But I'd love, Vanessa, to talk about fake sourdough and how supermarkets are selling to people like Jonathan as sourdough when actually there's nothing live or real about it other than perhaps the smell.

Starting point is 00:31:38 How do they do that, Melissa? So when you say to yourself or a doctor says to you, you need to re-look at your bread, you have to go beyond looking at the packet. You have to look for real sourdough. Now, there are, ironically, commercial producers of sourdough in large quantities that are making real sourdough. So, if I'm at the grocery store, how can I tell whether it's real or fake? Is that back to the number of ingredients on the back of the pack or is it something else? Yes and no. We have no regulation in the UK. The USA, I don't think it's also regulated, although I'd have to take a little bit deeper into that right now. But you have to look for the words that tell you that it is real sourdough and long-slayed fermented using live culture. At this point, we are completely reliant on the manufacturers communicating those facts to us. Just the word sourdough doesn't cut it. So don't believe it. If it says sourdough pizza, can I now just eat as much of that as I want and I'm healthy? Because if it's real sourdough,

Starting point is 00:32:42 it's all going to be fine? The thing is, Jonathan, sourdough itself is a process. Look at what you're actually processing. If you're still processing refined white carbs, no. So coming back to your lovely pizza, Jonathan, no, no. Sourdough on its own with white, if you don't have the fiber in there, it's pretty pointless. You might at best increase resistant starch, which might slow down a bit of your blood sugar response, and the fat from your lovely cheese might do that. But no, no, no, no, no. We need to look at the combination of whole grain, live bacteria, and time, and then you can have your lovely pizza with a glass of wine and enjoy it. So we always like to wrap up with a glass of wine and enjoy it.

Starting point is 00:33:29 So we always like to wrap up with some practical advice. And I think we've touched a lot of this already. But if we do want to eat bread, and I think most of us want to eat bread, are there any other top tips about how to make sure that we can do that in the healthiest way? Maybe starting with Tim? Well, it's just to reiterate that bread is still a good source of fiber and proteins, but if you get the wrong ones, it's going to cause you really bad sugar spikes. Always choose rye and whole grains and breads with mixed flours and added seeds when you can. And remember to look at a label when there is a label to try and get as low a carbohydrate to fiber ratio as possible and a really simple ingredient list. And those two things will give you an idea that if you are buying bread rather than making it yourself, you've got a chance of getting it right. And wherever possible, go to a specialist baker, artisan baker,

Starting point is 00:34:27 be prepared to pay more money for it because you can't make it in half an hour. So it is worth paying that extra money for the slow fermented sourdough bread that we've heard so much about. Vanessa, any other top tips you'd like to add? Yes. If you are faced with having to eat some bread that isn't whole grain and you need to eat refined bread, and let's face it, you can be in a social situation where this happens and you suddenly feel awkward and weird and rude because you're like, no, thank you. What you can actually do is you can change the rate and the way that your body assimilates your bread by eating a little bit of fiber-rich food beforehand. So you could have a small amount of soup or you could have some roasted vegetables

Starting point is 00:35:12 or something that actually lines your stomach before you eat your bread. And if you then were to combine your bread with a little bit of fat and protein, that again will slow down the rate that your body takes up those carbohydrates. So it's not just the way you make your bread, Jonathan, it's also the way you eat your bread. So you know that pizza you were talking about earlier? Yep, that would be a salad first, then your pizza with your cheese on top, a little bit of something for some protein and eating around the table with your friends and sharing. That's the key to bread. That is beautiful. I love that idea. The sad reality is if I eat the pizza, even with the cheese, actually my blood sugar goes through the roof because I am one of the people that's quite

Starting point is 00:35:55 on the extreme of this, but I'm aware of it. And so it needs to be something that I do as a treat. Well, Vanessa and Tim, we covered a lot of stuff, so you've made it particularly hard, but I'm going to try and summarize the key things that we've picked up on today. So firstly, bread matters because it's a huge source of the world's calories. We were grinding up grains for bread tens of thousands of years ago to make fermented biscuits, which is an amazing thing to think about. And the big change is actually very recently. So when we moved to cities and we moved to this new milling that sort of removed all the healthy outer coat of the seed, and it's had loads of benefits. It can be stored longer. It's easier to transport. But we had this byproduct

Starting point is 00:36:35 that we lost all the fiber. Sourdough is different because it has this sort of long, slow fermentation. The ultimate health of it, though, does depend what sort of flour you're using. Gluten is not an issue for most of us. A few people have celiacs. I think Tim said that 10% of people have sensitivity, but actually mainly caused by foods other than the gluten. So this is sort of symptom probably of a gut microbiome that's having issues rather than that the gluten in the bread is the core problem. Now, bread can be unhealthy, and particularly we turn it into blood sugar very fast. And the final, in terms of the top tips to improve your health,

Starting point is 00:37:13 if, like me, you want to keep eating bread, I think the number one thing is turn it over and look at the label, like you would if you were buying a wine. You wouldn't just buy something that said red wine. If there's a long list of ingredients, put it back on the shelf. Look at the amount of fiber. Sourdough is definitely the way to go, but make sure it's real. And finally, if you are going to eat this really refined bread, then think about what you put around it. And then finally, I think the best thing of all, bread comes from this word friend. It's meant to be eaten as

Starting point is 00:37:42 companionship. It's this thing we've been doing for tens of thousands of years. So you shouldn't think about a bread as something that's forbidden. You can never have it. Like we always say at Zoe, it's about understanding the balance and nothing should be off. Vanessa and Tim, thank you so much. That was a fantastic tour. I know there's so many more things we could have talked about. And as always, we look forward to returning to this topic again in the future. Thank you to Vanessa and Tim for joining me on Zoe Science and Nutrition today. We hope you enjoyed today's episode. If you did, please be sure to subscribe and leave us a review as we love reading your feedback. If this episode left you with any questions, please send them in on Instagram or Facebook and we will try to answer them in a future episode. At Zoe, we want to improve the health of millions by understanding

Starting point is 00:38:30 the right food for each of us to improve our health and manage our weight. That's why Zoe always starts with an at-home test, comparing you with participants in the world's largest nutrition science study. If you're interested in learning more about Zoe, you can head to joinzoe.com slash podcast and get 10% off your personalized nutrition program. As always, I'm your host, Jonathan Wolfe. Zoe Science and Nutrition is produced by Fascinate Productions, with support from Sharon Fedder and Alex Jones here at Zoe. See you next time.

ZOE Science & Nutrition - Can bread be healthy?

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