Many who suffer from conditions that affect the digestive system choose to remove grains and gluten from their diet due to intolerance. However in recent years a popular trend is now to remove them from their diet regardless, in a new ‘clean eating wave’. This means no bread, pasta, cereal, rice or oats, regardless of whether they are wholegrain.
The question on your lips must be is it healthy to completely remove a food group?
To answer this question let us look at what these foods provide us with. Wholegrains are healthy right? Most of us know that white breads, pasta and rice provide energy dense, nutrient poor food that is stripped of dietary fibre. As a consequence these foods cause a surge in blood sugar and subsequent insulin levels. Overtime this can lead to an increased risk of type 2 diabetes, (Gross et al 2004) found a link between the prevalence of diabetes and refined carbohydrate consumption. However the dietary fibre content of wholegrain varieties surely eliminates this risk? Whilst it is true consumption of wholegrains over more refined carbohydrates is associated with a reduced prevalence of type 2 diabetes (Ye et al 2012) wholegrains are still very energy dense and nutrient poor compared to fruits and vegetables.
The major benefit that wholegrains provide is that they are high in dietary fibre, which is essential to a maintaining a healthy digestive system, but has also been linked to a reduced risk of certain types of cancer as well as a reduced prevalence of cardiovascular disease and type 2 diabetes (Burley et al 2013 & Afshin et al 2014). The benefits and mechanisms of dietary fibre are beyond the scope of this article, but it is important to note that dietary fibre can be obtained in abundance from other sources. Eating a wide variety of fruit and vegetables on a daily basis can provide us with plenty of dietary fibre as well as being a more potent source of essential vitamins, minerals and anti-oxidants than wholegrains. Research has consistently linked higher levels of fruit and vegetable consumption to lower risks of all forms of lifestyle related disease (Hu et al 2014) All of these benefits come with the fact that fruit and vegetables are a lot less energy dense than wholegrains. This is significant for those of us that struggle to maintain either energy balance or an energy deficit without compromising the nutrient density of our diet. Removing wholegrains may have a significant effect on the energy content of the diet without compromising the quality. This leaves room for nutrient dense fats from nuts and oily fish, which are often avoided by those with body composition goals due to their energy content despite both being a rich source of essential fats. This is particularly the case for oily fish and omega 3 levels, which has been consistently shown to reduce disease related inflammation (Yan et al 2013).
For those of us who take part in regular exercise will now be saying but I need grains for energy, I will not be able to exercise intensely otherwise. A debate about high intensity exercise and fuel usage is again beyond the scope of this article but removing grains from the diet does not necessarily mean that the diet is inherently low carbohydrate. Fruit and vegetables can provide ample carbohydrate to fuel intensive exercise.
It is not that wholegrains are unhealthy, far from it. The question that has to be asked is there anything in wholegrains that you cannot get from another source in your diet? Do fruit and vegetables provide us with everything that grains can do and more? Can you obtain significant amounts of omega 3 without consuming energy dense fats?
The take home message is that going grain free may not compromise diet quality or energy levels, and may actually be beneficial in terms of providing essential vitamins and minerals if weight reduction or composition changes are your goal.
References
Afshin et al (2014). Consumption of nuts and legumes and the risk of incident Ischemic Heart Disease, Stroke and Diabetes; systematic review and meta-Analysis. American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, Vol 100 (1), 278-288
Burrey et al (2009). Dietary Fibre intake and risk of Cardiovascular Disease; Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis. BMJ (347)
Gross et al (2014). Increased Consumption of refined Carbohydrate and the epidemic of type 2 diabetes in the USA; an ecological assessment. American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, Vol 79, (1), 774-779.
Hu et al (2014). Fruit and Vegetable Consumption and Mortality from all causes, Cardiovascular Disease and Cancer; Systematic review and dose response; Met-Analysis of prospective cohort studies. BMJ.
Yan et al (2013). Omega 3 Fatty Acids prevent inflammation and metabolic disorder through inhibition of NLRP3 Inflammasome activation. Journal of Immunity, Vol 38 (6), 1154-1163.
Ye at al (2012). Greater Wholegrain intake is associated with a reduced risk of Type 2 Diabetes, Cardiovascular Disease and weight-gain. Journal of Nutrition, Vol 42 (7), 1304-1313.