commodity food, as it can be stored for many years without degrading. Health problems from rice, unlike other grains, are less common. Nonetheless, overreliance on rice with the husk removed (i.e., white or polished rice) led to widespread problems with beriberi, a condition that results in partial paralysis and heart failure due to a lack of the B vitamin thiamin – conditions that, I believe you would agree, are beriberi bad. This condition can develop within a few weeks, and it became a problem that plagued Asian sailors and soldiers given rations largely consisting of rice.
As with the seeds of all other grasses, rice shares the potential for excessive glycaemic effects. Carbs account for 85 per cent of the calories in rice, among the highest of all seeds of grasses. Rice-consuming cultures, for instance, can still experience plenty of diabetes. But the comforting notion that rice is among the most benign of grains is being challenged, as it has been the recipient of extensive genetic modification. This includes efforts to make it glyphosate resistant and able to express the Bt toxin, posing the same safety questions as for glyphosate-resistant and Bt toxin-containing corn.
And there’s another issue looming over this particular seed of a grass: rice is unique among grasses in its natural ability to concentrate inorganic arsenic from soil and water. (We can’t blame agribusiness for this effect.) Rice has a high arsenic content, according to reports confirmed by FDA analyses, though the FDA reassures us that no acute toxicity develops from such exposure.47 Substantial research, however, has associated chronic arsenic exposure with multiple forms of cancer, as well as cardiovascular and neurological diseases.48 In Bangladesh, where arsenic exposure is a major public health problem, increasing chronic arsenic exposure, starting at low levels, is associated with premalignant skin lesions, high blood pressure, neurological dysfunction and increased mortality.49 This analysis suggests that adverse health effects can manifest with chronic exposure provided by as little as one serving (approximately 185 g (6½ oz) cooked) of rice per day. The FDA had previously established an upper limit for arsenic in apple juice of 10 parts per billion; analyses of rice have found many rice products approaching or exceeding this cutoff.
The data that already exist linking low-level exposure of arsenic-contaminated water with increases in many chronic diseases is, in my mind, all the information we need. Makes you shudder to think about the old Rice Diet. Although at the more benign end of the spectrum as far as seeds of grasses go, enthusiastic consumption of rice in any form (white, brown or wild) is clearly not a good idea for health. Occasional consumption of small quantities (around 50 g (2 oz)) is probably all a healthy human can tolerate before triggering such concerns.
Oats
Oats are relative newcomers to the human dietary grass experience, having been first consumed only about 3,000 years ago. Few cultures embraced this grain, often regarding it as fodder for livestock or the food of barbarians, until the Welsh and Scots became avid oat consumers. Yet another close relative of wheat and member of the grass family, its gliadin-like protein, avenin, shares less overlap in its structure than its counterparts in rye and barley do. For this reason, the role of oats in the diet of people with coeliac disease has been debated for 50 years. The avenin protein is clearly more benign, though some oat varieties can mimic the immune effects of gliadin.50 (The notion of ‘gluten-free oats’ is therefore a fiction, as they still have a protein that can overlap in structure and effect.) Oats lack a lectin protein, so they do not contribute to the intestinal damage and inflammation inflicted by wheat germ agglutinin.51 This focus on the relatively benign nature of oats in comparison with the worst grain of all, though, falsely lulls people into thinking that just because it doesn’t have gluten-like properties, it must be good for you. Once again, overly simplistic nutritional thinking can get us into trouble.
There is plenty of talk about oats being ‘heart healthy’ and a rich source of soluble fibre, referring to the beta-glucan in oats that has been shown to reduce total and LDL cholesterol. All of that is true – except for the heart-healthy part. Although the beta-glucan fibre does indeed have some healthy effects on cholesterol values, the plentiful amylopectin starch of oats raises blood sugar to high levels and therefore provokes extravagant glycation – the irreversible process of modifying proteins when blood glucose rises. Oats provide an example of something that contains a mixture of good things and bad. The good effects are transient, such as the beta-glucan allowing healthier bowel movements and lower LDL cholesterol, or the B vitamins providing nutrition. But the bad effects are irreversible, especially those of glycation. Consumption of oats, like rice, is best kept to a minimum.
Sorghum
Sorghum was, until sucrose and high-fructose corn syrup became dominant, a popular source for sugar. Until the early 20th century, sorghum syrup was poured over pancakes and used to make sweets. Like all grains, sorghum is largely carbohydrate, with approximately 75 per cent of its calories coming from starch, triggering glycation as enthusiastically as the starchy seed of any other grass. It remains popular as fodder for livestock because it’s as useful for rapid fattening as wheat and corn are.
Sorghum is an especially interesting grass, as it is toxic, and even fatal, when consumed before it’s fully mature; its high cyanide content has been known to decimate herds of livestock, causing death by cardiac arrest. This grass grows wild in much of Africa and is believed to have been first domesticated in the savannahs around 4,000 years ago. While it is a ‘true grass’ from the family Poaceae, sorghum is less closely related to the grasses discussed above. The gliadin protein counterpart in sorghum, kafirin, is only distantly related and therefore does not trigger coeliac or other undesirable gliadin responses. Despite the more benign nature of kafirin proteins, sorghum is still the seed of a grass and is therefore largely indigestible. Accordingly, the proteins in sorghum are poorly digested; about half of them pass right through the human gastrointestinal tract undisturbed.52 This has prompted manipulations to increase digestibility, including mutating the plant’s genetics with gamma radiation and chemicals, genetically modifying it by inserting genes for more digestible proteins, and mechanically or enzymatically processing the flour, all to enhance digestibility.
It is not clear what would happen to humans who relied too much on sorghum as a calorie source. But given its problematic indigestible proteins and high starch content, it is worth minimizing exposure, as with rice and oats.
There’s a Snake in the Grass
To complete our discussion of the seeds of grasses, I should mention that bulgur is simply a combination of different strains of wheat, though often of the durum variety, such as that used in pasta. But it is still wheat, with virtually all the same problems. Triticale is the result of mating wheat with rye; as you would predict, it also shares all of the same issues due to its parentage.
Millet, teff and amaranth, all added to our diets over the last few thousand years, are among several other less-common seeds of grasses that humans consume. None cause the range of health difficulties that wheat, rye, barley, corn, bulgur, triticale or sorghum are responsible for, nor have they been the recipients of enthusiastic genetic modification. However, they’re still high in carbohydrates given their amylopectin content. In France, ortolan songbirds made morbidly obese on a diet of millet and oats, then drowned in Armagnac, set on fire, and consumed whole were considered a delicacy that was savoured for its rich, dripping fat. (This is now outlawed.) Just like corn and wheat, grains whose only known problem is their amylopectin starch are still quite effective at fattening up pigs, cows, songbirds and humans.
Some people feel that they can consume a small quantity of these glycaemically challenging grains now and then without paying a health price, but bear in mind that each time you consume these starchy seeds you invite greater and greater health compromises, just as you do when you eat a bag of jelly beans.
The Human Diet: A Grass-Free Zone
You may want your beef to be grass-fed, but you shouldn’t be that way.
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