7 Grain: whole grains

Showing posts with label whole grains. Show all posts

Saturday, April 29, 2113

Monday, July 29, 2013

New Grains in 7 Grain Menu: Long Grain Brown Rice

Rice is a basic grain for most gluten free products. We use Cajun Country Long Grain Brown Rice which is grown and produced in Louisiana. We mill it ourselves to make sure our customers get the freshest brown rice flour available. Brown rice has much higher levels of many vitamins and minerals than white rice.

It’s an excellent source of manganese and selenium. Just one cup of cooked brown rice provides 88% of your daily need for manganese, a mineral that helps us digest fats and get the most from the proteins and carbohydrates we eat.

Studies indicate that whole grain brown rice may cut diabetes risk, lower cholesterol, helped maintain a healthy weight. It is a natural whole grain rice with nothing but the husk removed, so it retains all bran.

We developed few delicious new gluten free recipes based on brown rice flour: Brown Rice Millet Bread, Brown Rice Biscotti with Flax Seeds and Oat Bran Apple Cinnamon Muffins. Check them out when you are at the Covington or Slidell Farmer’s Market next time.

Nutrition Facts

Serving Size: 1/4 cup (49 g)

Nutrient Amount % DV

Calories 170 Calories from Fat 14

Total Fat 1.5 g 3%

Sodium 0 mg 0%

Total Carbohydrate 38 g 13%

Dietary Fiber 3 g 13%

Protein 4 g

Wednesday, May 1, 2013

Healthy Homemade Granola

Our homemade granola is getting more and more popular among our friends and customers. And that’s the only gluten free product we make. Granola is organic oat-based cereal. There are sunflower seeds, flax seeds, pecan nuts, coconut flakes, raisins, cranberries, honey, oil, sea salt and vanilla. You can have for breakfast or as a healthy snack during a day. Eat it plain or with your milk or yogurt.

Why our granola is healthy?

First of all it’s a whole grain cereal. Oats are whole grains, and that means they retain all the nutrition that are contained in bran, germ and endosperm of the kernel. According to the Dietary Guidelines from the US Department of Health and Human Services whole grains such as granola might lower your risk for type 2 diabetes and heart disease.

Second, granola provides you with a much needed dietary fiber, which you can find only in veggies, fruits, beans and whole grains. Dietary fiber helps you to fight constipation and type 2 diabetes. It also lowers the level of bad cholesterol. All this seeds and dried fruits we add to our granola increase the total volume of fiber.

Third, granola provides you with essential nutrients such as iron and potassium, vitamin E and healthy omega-3 fatty acids.

Fourth, our granola is completely sugar free. We use honey to sweeten it. Most of the commercial brands are loaded with sugar. They can have as much as 17 g of sugar for a serving size. It’s more than a tablespoon of sugar! It’s way too much.

Eating homemade granola for breakfast will help you to start your morning with a fulfilling and delicious meal, boosting your energy and concentration without extra sugar or caffeine.

It’s great for kids, weight watchers, athletes and all other people who want to stay healthy, look and feel just great.

Thursday, April 25, 2013

Just a reminder

Make at least half your grains whole grains!

Tuesday, April 2, 2013

Whole truth about whole grains

According to survey conducted by the American Dietetic Association in 2011 about 48% of asked consumers indicated that they started eating more whole grain foods. It’s sounds like a great news isn’t it? Whole grains are hot these days. Healthy food awareness is rising. We are reading labels when buying food and chose the ones that has words like “good source”, “multigrain”, “made with the whole wheat” etc.

But what does these words really mean? Let’s examine them.

First of all, we have to understand that regulations about using such words are pretty loose in US. The producers can put claim their product as whole grain if it contains at least 51% of whole grain, which is by the way, considered to be 8g per serving.

Would you buy the same bread if it would say “51% whole grain bread” or even “64% whole grain pasta”? The truth is that the producers don’t have to show the numbers on a package. And in our mind “whole grain” sounds like “100% whole grain, when in reality it’s far from it. In most cases other 49% are filled with not very healthy stuff like refined, enriched or unbleached wheat or rice flour, soy products, dough conditioners, extra gluten, lecithin, emulsifiers just to name few.

It’s also true of products that have “the good source of whole grain” and “rich in whole grain” on the box. Usually a serving of many foods weights 30 to 55g (1-2 ounces). Let’s do simple math. 8g out of 55g are just 15%. That means that “good source” “whole grain” foods could be as much as 85% refined grain! So, unless it says 100% whole grain, you have to really check what the product consists of.

And by the way “100% whole grain” according to contemporary regulations means that serving has 16g of whole grains.

What about “multigrain” and “whole grain blends” claims?

“Multi” just mean “many” and it also can be replaced with the number like 5-grains, 7 or even 12. The product can even have traces of all this different grains, but that doesn’t necessary mean that they are whole. It doesn’t matter if you are getting 5, 7, 12 or even 32 grains, because they are mostly refined.

Now to the blends. It’s a very smart move in the marketing strategies. Because usually “Whole grain” is written in a big print and “blend” in a small one. And you get what you get a blend. It can consist of refined flour and some wheat bran or wheat fiber tossed in. And really a blend can be anything in the range from mostly refined flour to half and half. If you look hard you can probably find the percentage of whole grains in small print on the back of the box.

It feels like unless you make your own food you can't be sure that it's really wholesome and healthy. It’s kinda sad. Isn’t it?

7 Grain

The smell of freshly baked bread fills the house ...