As a nation of immigrants, Americans have found themselves incorporating foods from all over the world. Long before we as a society learned that "whole grains" were good for us, immigrants were bringing to our shores their enduring appetites for the foods of their homelands. If they couldn't buy it, they would make it, or plant it, or import it from their countries of origin.
My father's parents were born in Russia and then fled to the United States in the late 1800's. Even before they learned to speak English, my grandparents were looking for the brown bread and borscht--beet soup. Now, brown bread and beet soup might not sound very tasty, but both are very healthy foods. Besides being nutritious, these foods reminded my grandparents of home. Their taste for these foods was about the only things my grandparents could bring with them, and they handed their love of these foods down to their children
I remember that as I was growing up, pumpernickel was the only bread my father would eat. Pumpernickel is a hearty brown bread that is almost a meal in itself. My father never ate the white bread so readily available. No, he would send me to a baked goods outlet store to buy all the whole grain (brown) breads I could find. Every four to six weeks, I'd go into that store and walk out juggling ten fresh loaves in my arms.
My dad constantly told me that the dark breads were "good for the stomach." It wasn't until I was older that I understood why wheat and whole grain foods were supposed to be good for us. These foods contain fiber, and fiber is very good for -- how shall I put it -- cleaning you out.
With white breads, the nutrients are taken out and all that's left is just plain white flour. Many of the companies that produce white breads try to put some of the extracted nutrients back in, they call that enriching the flour, but that's nothing like the real thing--whole grains.
In the last decade or so, word started to get out that there should be more whole grains in our diets. It was hoped that these grains might play some part in helping to prevent heart disease and colon cancer. However, in 1999, some research discovered that whole grains and fiber might not be as beneficial to our health as we were being led to believe. Studies, using nurses, factored in all the things in their lives that that might cause cancer, like smoking and family background. It was discovered that there was no real proof that whole grains prevented colon cancer. Some doctors still question these findings.
But one thing on which everyone agrees on is that high fiber foods can't hurt. They are better for us, especially our hearts.
All this somehow leads me to my friend, Julie, who has had her share of stomach problems. I've known her for 20 years, and for 20 years she's been complaining about constipation. One day, when she was about to dig into a tuna sandwich on white bread, I suggested to Julie that she try the darker bread I was eating. She looked at me and burst out laughing saying that a good tuna sandwich depended on white bread. I tried telling Julie that adding whole grain foods, with all the natural fiber, might be a pleasant alternative to having to force herself to chug down her fiber drink every morning. And I said, handing her a part of my sandwich, "Dark bread adds to the flavor of a yummy tuna sandwich."
All this worked out for the best, however. Now Julie drives both of us to the bread outlet every few weeks.
If you want to know more, here are a few sites to guide you in finding out more about whole grains:
What exactly are whole grains?
