How Ultra-Processed Bread Took Over America | Ultra-Processed Life | Business Insider

[Music] bread has been one of the most important sources of calories and nutrients across cultures for Millennia today it's a $200 billion industry around the world here in America ultr processed white bread is the norm but this is what bread used to look like it was typically made with just three ingredients flour water and yeast but nowadays your average loaf of white bread can easily contain up to 20 ingredients including salt sugar fats and oils a cocktail of chemicals like dough conditioners ascorbic acid bleach and more and somehow this bread is a lot less nutritious

than this so how did a food that has been such a staple change so much and what kind of impact does that have on our bodies I'm Mia degraph I'm a health editor at Business Insider the first traces that archaeologists have ever found of bread is these crumbs that are 14,000 years old that they found from a Neolithic site in Jordan these crumbs seem to have been made from a rudimentary flatbread that were sort of a combination of water and ground up grains kind of the ancestors of modern-day cereals Egyptians discovered yeast likely by accident

but the way Egyptians were making bread was what we would describe today as a Sourdough and that was the kind of bread that we were making then for centuries so we could see from the Egyptians that bread making could proliferate an entire society and sustain an entire Community pyramid Builders were paid with bread people in higher status positions were people who are overseeing the production of bread that only develops further by the time you get to 150 BC in the Roman Empire bread making by then was a really prestigious career so how did bread come

to the US rumor has it that when Christopher Columbus journeyed to the new world he brought a Crockpot of sourdough sta with him and once we started mass producing wheat across the US bread as a business and as a culture really kicked off in the 1880s we saw the industrialization of bread and that kicked off with mechanically milled flour these Mills would remove the ger of the flour it contains so many nutrients it's got proteins oils Omega-3s all of that good stuff but it makes it quite unruly in a bake they remove the bran remove

the germ of the flour and completely pulverize the flour so that it is as fine as it can possibly be suddenly you don't have that volatile element that could be a margin for error in your business you can just scale this right up and make bread that seems to be very consistent every time so that's what we've you've seen with all these Ms adding different kinds of chemicals and adding different kinds of ingredients how could we make something that is shelf stable continuously fluffy and just delicious at all times in the late 1800s we invented

commercial yeast this is a kind of dried yeast that can last way longer than fresh yeast fresh yeast like a sourdough starter or a bomb you've got to treat it you've got to feed it but it's not the kind of thing that you could use for mass production so easily but a commercial yeast it's dehydrated in such a way that it could last for weeks and weeks and weeks the mass-produced white bread or the fluffy kind of Wonderbread that we have today was invented in the early 1900s but it wasn't sliced it was just this

big block of fluffy white dough in the early 1900s an engineer called uto reder had an idea that you could make a one single machine that slices and packages bread all at the same time it took him about a decade to finally finish his prototype we get to 1928 when he debuted his invention at a fair in Missouri and it was a huge hit people's minds were blown and within 2 years the Continental Baking Company which is the maker of Wonderbread was used using it I know mine eat their lunch now I pack their favorite

sandwiches on their favorite Bread Wonder can't feed it up this Wonderbread it's already got a ton of things in it that make it shelf stable add the packaging it's going to last you for a week or more you know maybe even longer it was a huge Game Changer in American culture the war was starting the economy is really hard up you have this thing that's going to last you for a very long time it actually created a supermarket culture and really decades later we can see it created this huge shift in how we shop and

eat and live in this country by 1930 mass-produced loaves made up 30% of the average American's diet which was a higher proportion than any other food but scientists started to see the results of eating this bread that had all of the nutrients removed from it around the start of the second world war we started to see people developing diseases with quite worrying symptoms there are diseases like pellagra which has symptoms of Dementia or berry berry which has symptoms of paralysis or losing the feeling in your hands and feet people also had rickets which is the

weakening of Bones iron deficiency birth defects in response the US government collaborated with manufacturing companies including the Wonderbread manufacturer Continental baking company to produce and promote these more fortified versions of Wonderbread that's why you can help yourself grow bigger and stronger eight ways with Wonderbread I mean grow bigger and stronger eight ways while this didn't make Ultra processed white bread as healthy as a whole grain it did prevent people from developing diseases which is capitalism at its finest each delicious slice of Wonderbread supplies protein for muscle minerals for strong bones and teeth carbohydrates for energy

vitamins for nerves all vital elements for growing minds and bodies the point of ultr processed bread is really um business opportunity it's something that was scalable it's developed for convenience so what are the ingredients in a typical loaf of ultra processed bread so first we have tartaric acid also known as daytim this is an emulsifier which is used to make bread smoother or fluffier and to stop ingredients from separating emulsifiers are generally believed to be safe in small quantities but gut health experts worry that the combination of water and oil that's used to make this

may wear down the gut lining in a way that can make you susceptible to digestive issues and digestive diseases next we have corn syrup this is a really common ingredient in Ultra processed foods including bread it's super sweet it can be used to mask the more chemical flavors of an ultr processed food after it's been broken down and had so many things added to it to keep it shelf stable one of the health effects of corn syrup is that it's a high fructose type of sweetener and it means that your liver has to work harder

to break it down than say glucose that can put you at risk of fatty liver disease as well as the risks of just consuming a lot of sugar if you consume a lot of sugar you're at a higher risk of diabetes inflammation heart disease obesity and all of the classic things that are associated with high sugar diet another common ingredient used is acetic acid this is an antimicrobial that's used to prevent mold from growing or to prevent the bread from going off or going stale quicker it's a vinegar that can be used in other typ

of food production acetic acid is not dangerous to human health in the amounts that are used in store bought bread but it is part of this perfect storm of chemicals that are used to make bread last way longer than it naturally would then we have calcium carbonate this is a dough conditioner which is used to improve texture and shelf life of ultra processed bread so on its own calcium carbonate is not that bad for you and in fact it can be good for you the issue with calcium carbonate in ultr processed bread is that it's

making something inherently unhealthy quite enticing another common sweetener in Ultra processed bread is molasses this is something which is quite popular with home Bakers too it's a sweetener that has a low glycemic index so in theory it would be healthier for you than a refined sugar it can still Spike your blood sugar especially if it's used in an ultr processed bread that you're naturally going to eat a lot of ultr processed food drives people to eat more of it another ingredient that you will see on basically every label of storeo bread is a scorc acid

this is a type of vitamin C which sounds great the issue with this scorc acid is that it's used in the manufacturing process as a flow treatment to fortify the dough against a rather aggressive manufactur ing process so it means that we can toss this dough around and slam it against machines and pulverize it in a way that's quite unnatural unless you have all of these ingredients inserted into it a common preservative used in starbo bread is Eline hydrochloride which is derived from duck feathers or human hair it's an amino acid which is used to

prolong shelf life and also enhance the flavor of processed Foods the FDA says that this is actually safe for human health but it is widely regarded as just gross you also have bleach which is added to the bread to make it look whiter so this can be done by adding chlorine dioxide gas to the flour before it reaches the manufacturing plant we also have azodicarbonamide which is used as a bleach and as a foam expander to give bread a fluffier feel this is an ingredient that's also used used in vinyl flooring and yoga mats to

give it a squishy feel the FDA says that it's safe to use in small amounts but the EU and Australia and other countries disagree aooc carbonide has been banned as a food additive for years due to concerns that a byproduct can be cancerous of course you have preservatives to prolong shelf life so that could be calcium propionate fats are used in a store booat loaf for volume and fluffiness and shelf stability look on your label for something like mono or D glycerides that's made from soybeans and other oils to give it that kind of fluffiness

and also to help it last a little longer let's take a look at these breads first we have Wonderbread iconic packaging so this even holding it it is so extremely fluffy I can't ignore that fact and this ingredient list is huge the main ingredient in this is unbleached enriched flour the second highest proportion ingredient is water then we have sugar yeast so we then have a very long list of micro ingredients let's say calcium carbonate wheat gluten soybean oil salt dough conditioners sodium staro lacate I don't know if I got that calcium stair Royal monoglycerides

mono glyceride calcium peroxide calcium iodate vinegar citric acid what colal ciferal it sounds like a name of Game of Thrones soy lean calcium propionate and that's it wow that was a journey okay now we have Nature's Own 100% whole wheat and this has 13 G of whole grain per slice hot healthy whole wheat this is great this is something that I would look for in a store you want to see whole wheat or whole grain but let's see what's on the label so we have whole wheat flour that's the first ingredient and that's great we

have distill monoglyceride so that's a fat that's used in the process to create volume and bounciness and fluffiness to your bread it's not necessarily bad for you in small amounts and this is less than 2% you know it's a a fat that can impact your cholesterol levels or inflammation in your body pepper Farms Farmhouse multi-grain bread so first off the bat multigrain this is something that I try to avoid I would say if you're buying stb bread none of it's going to be that good for you but multigrain is not in the same league as

whole grain or whole wheat whole grain and whole wheat they have the entire kernel of the original wheat intact multi-grain this just tells you that it is made from loads of different kinds of flour it's not telling you that it's necessarily a very healthy type of bread so that's a bit of a red flag for me no high fructose corn syrup that's nice so in theory it's signaling that this is a healthy bread let's look at the label okay immediate red flag this has per slice 5 g of sugar that is really high that's double

the amount of sugar in a SCE of Wonderbread the ingredients here we have enriched wheat flour it's nice that it has oats in it though in very small proportion and this is extremely high in sugar for one slice of bread according to the USDA your daily intake of total sugars including from fruit or coffee or tea in very minuscule amounts shouldn't exceed 50 g which is 12 teaspoons so let's look at how many teaspoons are in this loaf of bread one oh my God we're halfway through 9 10 11 12 so that's the total daily

intake that anyone should have from anything 13 14 15 wow that is how much sugar is in this these have the pieces of Oats on them they look very grainy and healthy but I can feel from the squishiness and even just see from the bounciness of the dough this is definitely an ultra processed slice of bread and I can see from the ingredients list that there is stuff in there that is not what I would be going for for a nutritious lunch so this is how much sugar is in two slices of this bread and

it doesn't look like a lot it's not a lot but if you're buying this cuz you expect it to be healthy you probably don't expect to be having more than a spoonful of sugar with every slice that you eat then we have Arnold stone ground made with 100% whole grain 0 g trans fat good source of fiber and it has a big love heart that says heart healthy which is very sweet let's look at the label the main ingredient is stone ground whole wheat flour which is indeed very good for you so yes there are

elements in this that do make this more heart healthy than some of the other breads in the store but it does contain those Telltale chemicals which show you that this is something that is not something that you could make at home if Ultra processed bread is a main stay of your diet it's going to put you at risk for a bunch of kind of serious health issues so all of the nutrients are essentially pre-digested it creates a cascading effect that can dramatically increase inflammation in your body the lack of fiber really dries up your risk

of digestive issues and including something like constipation take for example the fact that when Ultra processed white bread was first marketed to Americans one of the benefits was that you're not going to need the toilet as often and there's people who are eating whole wheat bread so it goes to show that whole wheat bread quite clearly keeps you regular and white bread does not the US government played a huge role in constructing the kind of bread manufacturing that we have today it all started in the Great Depression when the US government provided subsidies for Farms

during a quite tricky time for the economy and also to prevent over production of certain things Uncle Sam is rewarding the Midwest farmers who have done their part in curbing corn and hog production to raise prices at Knoxville Iowa the First Federal checks are distributed as loans to the farmers that was really the beginning of what's now known as the farm bill but it essentially provides subsidies for major Farms that are m producing homogeneous kinds of wheat that can go to big manufacturing plants and make bread that will serve the entire country the farm bill

is not subsidizing smaller Farms that are providing grain for local Bakers and something that's maybe a slightly more diverse style of grain so they're not able to reduce the cost of their loaves in the same way that ultr processed manufactured loaves can the cost of an ultra processed white loaf is around $2 or under under $2 but that's at the lower end of the scale of bread cost in the US if you're looking for something more artisanal you're looking for like a sour dough or something from a homemade Bakery those can get very expensive up

to say $12 Americans are consuming way less bread than they were before because of a wave of health conscious attitudes and the rise of low carb diets there was a huge shift towards low carb in the 80s and '90s that had a really really dramatic effect on our entire bread eating culture in the year 2000 the average American was eating about 138 lb of grains per year which includes bread by 2014 that dropped to an average of 122 lb per year it doesn't sound like a huge drop but it's pretty significant in just a decade

still the business hasn't gotone away and it has in fact grown it's now worth about $26 billion so it's thriving and it's definitely something that's still a part of our culture but how we're choosing to consume it has shifted and brands have been racing to catch up with that so what should you look for on a label when you're trying to buy healthy bread number one look for non-refined flour you're looking for something that hasn't had all of the goodness M out of it look for low added sugar or ideally no added sugar no trans

fats trans fats are incredibly bad for you would increase your risk of heart disease ideally few additives just the nature of the manufacturing process means that you need certain additives just simply to make it go through the machines but as few additives as you can have the better be aware and this kind of rings true for all packaged food that there are certain bogus words and terms like healthy or made with real wheat those aren't regulated terms so if a label has that on it you can just disregard it it doesn't mean anything make sure

whole grain is listed as the first or second ingredient if you're looking for a loaf that has a good amount of grain in it if you look at the ingredients list the first one listed is the most plentiful pick whole wheat or whole grain so whole grain and whole wheat both have the whole aspect of the wheat it has the germ the endosperm the brown the entire kernel of wheat multi grain does not need to have all those things look for something that contains a lot of nuts and seeds that's just going to increase the

amount of protein in it and healthy fats and healthy oils and most importantly look at the label and see where the flour is from or where the bread is from so I will say one of the things that local farmers Regional Farmers local Bakers grain activists really passionately are trying to communicate to all of us that all is not lost you can still buy a delicious nutritious loaf of bread so the best way that you're going to get access to something that was grown without chemicals without sort of any all of the complexities of mass

production is if you're going to have something grown near you so look for flour that is from your estate look for loaves that were made in your state get to know your local Baker go to your local farmers market there are lots of people especially Farmers on private Farms who don't have the support of government money who are really passionate about educating people about where you can get good bread while buying bread at your local farmers market may seem like a more expensive luxury it may actually be a worthwhile investment in the long run it

could save you money that you might have had to spend on your health it could keep you younger for longer and it could cut inches on your waistline without you even having to try if if you're still unsure try baking your own bread because that way you'll know exactly what goes into it but this is what bread used to look like is what bread used to look like is what bread used to look like this reminds me of like being in the service industry I used to have to like open a wine bottle at a

table and I'm like oh God