100 percent real flour

100 percent real flour points out that most commercial bakers use a fake which masquerades as the genuine article to make their bread.

The "wholemeal" that you find on supermarket shelves is certainly not what it makes out to be.

The call to completely give up bread if we are overweight or diabetic is a tough one. It really does not have to be heeded unless one is morbidly obese; and then only for a season until those unwanted pounds have been shed. It's the refined-flour used in commercial baking that does the damage.

Instead turn to baking bread with 100 percent real flour; if you can find it. You may have to buy your own mill. Otherwise it is unlikely you'll maintain that weight loss which you have worked so hard at achieving.

Bread is so central to our culture. The reason all diets fail is because we are simply unable to heed that advice indefinitely; nor need one. Instead find a source of 100 percent real flour.

But we will have to accept a thing or two; real flour like all good food is a perishable-product. The oils in it start to go rancid once the kernel has been cracked.

From your own grinder there is no separation of the three-streams as happens in commercial milling; the bran, germ and endosperm are fully intact in 100 percent real flour. A deep and profoundly wonderful aroma, difficult to describe greets you as it is ground; something most folk have never smelled.

The colour too will be quite different to commercial wholemeal; it's a pale-brown.

• Terminology used in a grain of wheat
  

Extraction rate

If you want to have your bread and eat it with pleasure and no guilt, there is only one solution; you have to find a source of fresh 100 percent real flour so you can bake your own loaf. It is virtually impossible to buy. It simply is not to be found on supermarket shelves.

Told off by my own growing waistline I began to realise that we were faced with Hobson's Choice^[5].

In that metaphor you are told that you have a choice but really you don't; the only horse available for hire is the one at the front of the race. Take it or leave it.

Colorectal cancer is the third most common malignant tumour in the United States; excluding those of the skin.

So I began to realise it was either buy a mill and grind my own 100 percent real flour and bake bread or go without. I am now 20 pounds lighter though other things have changed too.

The alternatives were too ghastly to contemplate; growing obesity, the threat of diabetes and disability. The thought of being continually on this or that diet that I knew full well were all doomed to fail brought no pleasure; or worse still having to give up bread completely for ever.

Neither appealed to my wife or myself so we took the plunge and bought a mill. It was expensive but today, thirty-years later, Hawo still grinds our flour faithfully every morning, having paid herself off so many times over that we've lost count.

You see your own 100 percent real flour costs one-quarter of the counterfeit wholemeal found on the supermarket shelves.

This is our faithful old Hawo. In the top third of the container you can see the freshly-milled 100 percent real flour; and below the fake that masquerades as wholemeal. They are quite different.

You see there is a big fat-lie in milling; the industrial giants are allowed by international law^[1] to call their flour "wholemeal" provided they do not remove more than 40% of the goodies.

And most of us are none the wiser and cannot understand why bread made from this fake is adding inches to our waistline; and has no flavour.

Millers are allowed to call it whole grain even when 49% of the bran and germ have been removed. The marketing of all wheat products is completely undermined by this massive lie, unwittingly making us unwell and obese.

My conspiracy theory is that this is precisely the marketing strategy of certain hoodlums in white coats. A sickly, obese nation needs many drugs; and surgeons are kept busy with knee replacements, coronary artery stents and liver transplants.

Fatty liver ironically is caused by a chronic overload of refined carbohydrate; not butter, cheese and eggs.

Difficult though it may be, that means no commercial bread.

Protein

There are 9 amino-acids that are considered essential; we cannot synthesise them and absolutely must get all nine from our food. They are the building blocks of protein in our bodies.

The bran proteins are strikingly high in these nutritionally essential amino acids^[7]. We use all-purpose and bread flour to our great detriment.

Completely duped

In fact commercial milling does far worse than that; it makes us very sick too. They remove the vitamin E that is nature's anti-coagulant so we have heart attacks and strokes. They refine out the bran where the lignans that help prevent breast tumours are found; and a lot more also.

That is where the protein, the minerals like calcium and many other important phytonutrients such as riboflavin are located; they are sold to the pig-farmer or supplement companies.

They put some synthetics back and have the utter arrogance to call it "enriched," after they have just impoverished the 100 percent real flour that should be used to bake our bread; we have been thoroughly duped. 

In one sense they are just giving us what we want. Many folk do not like bread that they have to chew and is not light and fluffy; it must slide delectably down the throat.

But the millers are the ones who have taught us to love bread, cakes and scones made from refined flour so that they can sell off the best parts at a handsome profit.

Understanding how net carbs work is a big part of the solution; remove the fibre and immediately a host of problems are introduced.

It is that fibre which activates the stress receptors in the stomach that inform the hunger centre in the hypothalamus when we should stop eating.

King and pawn

So who is going to live into his nineties? Will it be the king or the pawn?

The pawn is unlikely to be able to afford to purchase his own mill despite the saving once the capital is paid off. The king on the other hand will have acquired a taste for the finer things of life and most likely will eschew any bread not made from the whitest flour. I wouldn't put my money on either of them.

Chess is a great leveler; a wonderful game but both kings and pawns are mostly knocked over long before their time. Have you heard of "fool's mate?"

Hobson's choice

So it is back to Hobson's choice. For my part I will accept the horse at the front of the pack; she may not be quite so pretty but I can enjoy my bread utterly without guilt, not groaning constantly under this or that diet.

The ketogenic diets incidentally are the only ones that come close to being effective but you still have to give up bread for ever; rather find a source of 100 percent real flour.

The longevity diet certainly has some appeal too.

Can you have your bread and eat it? Yes, sirree but you will need a mill and have to spend five minutes every day preparing the dough for the best tasting loaf in the world. Have a salad and some fruit with it; sprinkle it with some freshly-ground nuts and seeds. Regularly take a few short walks and you'll never have to diet again; period.

For me, it is Hobson's choice. There is no other way; bread made from 100 percent real flour or nothing.

One other little joy is that butter is back; it simply completes a slice of sourdough bread made from 100 percent real flour. You really have no need of the jams, jellies and processed meats that are required to make palatable the loaf that otherwise tastes like cardboard.

When commercial bread becomes loathsome to you, then you know you have arrived.

This is a lot more than just a slice of bread and butter; it's sourdough made with 100 percent flour. The taste is unbelievable and the nutrition even better; it is real food. One need have no qualms about carbs like this even if you are on a ketogenic diet; but still keep the load down and take that walk after lunch.

The bran in 100 percent real flour is a rich source of betaine; really it should be called one of the B vitamins.

• What is betaine?
  

You will quite quickly find that one slice of real bread is enough; it's all about those stretch receptors in the stomach that message the brain.

Sourdough

I'm serious about the five-minutes by the way; that is all it takes once you are in the groove to grind your 100 percent real flour and prepare the sourdough. I hope you are beginning to see that there is a vast difference between real and fake bread; the latter is a poor shadow of the genuine article.

We got started on making the superior loaf some ten years ago one Sourdough September, as it is celebrated. As happens so often I was introduced to it quite by chance by a fellow baker who gave me some of her concoction; it's been a life-changer.

They bake only sourdough bread made from unrefined flour in the five Blue Zones of the world; longevity is the word.

Pizza

You too may have found that giving up pizza for ever is simply breaking your heart. That could be because you find it indigestible and it gives you a bellyache; or since the refined, tasteless dough is making you fat.

Once you learn about 100 percent real flour and how to bake using sourdough, both problems are solved.

This sourdough pizza crust is simply divine. It is very nutritious, won't add to your woes and costs a fraction of the price.

Chicken pie

We are going to start experimenting using this sourdough pizza crust to replace the puff-pastry so often recommended when baking a chicken pie. Giving up refined grains for ever is the beginning of a new journey. It's more work obviously but the taste is so much better; and the big carrot is that you no longer have to count calories and worry about becoming diabetic.

I prefer the thought of spending more time cooking nutritious food and a lot less consulting doctors and pharmacists. Is a life almost without medication a pipe dream? Neither the good wife or I, in our eighth decade take any drugs whatsoever.

100 percent real flour

100 percent real flour contains all the vitamins, minerals and fibre. It means having a small mill and knowing about storing wheat. This may all seem far too arduous to you; it's one small part of what we call the green journey^[4].

The protection from lignans against breast tumours is central to our wellness^[3]; and the vitamin E which is such an important anti-coagulant.

What exactly is a dietary fiber you may be thinking; that's where the lignans are found.

Shane Warne

This week in history saw the death of one of the greatest cricketers of all time; an Australian leg-spin bowler. He was only 52.

Those with long memories will recall that he was once sponsored by a nicotine-patch company but was caught out smoking at a party.

We will miss you, Warney. You gave so much to cricket. Hopefully your premature death will serve as a reminder to us that both the King and the Pawn will end up in the same box long before their time if they smoke; you lost a third of your life.

Salt

There is no question of it, most of us enjoy too much salt; mostly from processed foods and eating out.

Salt high blood pressure is an important but controversial subject; you can also have too little.

Baking your own bread gives you a measure of control over how much salt you are consuming; our recipes have half the amount in commercial loaves.

There is a spiritual aspect of caring for the body with good food and avoiding junk; the spinoff is that a sound and blameless body suffers from a lot less pain.

It's interesting that in all five Blue Zones where longevity is the keyword, they are religious.

Calcium

Dietary calcium is slowly assimilated in the blood reducing the risk of cardiovascular disease. However taken as a supplement results in high levels of the mineral in circulation raising the spectre of CV conditions and dementia^[8].

• Wheat berries and 100 percent real flour contain 83mg of calcium /100 grams.
• "Unenriched whole wheat flour" contains only 38mg of calcium; more than half has been extracted.

The Big Fat Lie continues to obfuscate; make obscure, unclear and unintelligible.

We are disciples of Hippocrates; let your food be your medicine. Get your calcium from 100 percent real flour; kefir is also an excellent source^[9].

• Get your calcium from kefir
  

Wholemeal

Interestingly the Bread and Flour Regulations in the UK “prohibit the use of the term wholemeal in the naming of or advertising of any of these products.”

The word "wholemeal" has largely become meaningless.

Many food companies openly use non-wholemeal flour for products that are advertised misleadingly; the Big Fat Lie.

Yes they are labelled using the word "wholemeal."

The honest truth is there are very few if any true wholemeal products for sale; the public doesn't like them and food companies cannot make a decent profit from them.

Our true wholemeal costs a third of a dollar or 25 pence sterling per kilogramme. You won't find it in the grocery store at any price.

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