Whether you are new to the Berlin Natural Bakery family or you have been with us for sometime now, I felt it was important to talk about varying differences in our breads and where those differences come from. 

Many of the differences you may see from loaf to loaf has to do with the fact that we are a small batch bakery. Each loaf of bread is baked essentially from scratch in 100 loaf batches. We do next to no processing and we use as minimal ingredients as we possibly can. This means that we don't have a bunch of extraneous ingredients to add to each batch to ensure "cookie cutter" loaves every single time. 

We are very dependent on the quality of each harvest and every harvest is different depending on: yearly amount of rain, humidity, sun exposure, wind exposure and more! 

Most mass-producing bread companies can make up for these variables by adding a whole variety of dough conditioners (to make the dough easy to work with), artificial colors (to ensure each loaf is the exact same color), added gluten (to make sure the bread puffs up really nice) and more. 

Because of our commitment to purity, we do not use these "artificial helpers" but thankfully we have a very highly skilled baking team that is able to adjust based on the differences between each harvest of grain. 

All of this means that yes, you may see differences from time to time if you order from us regularly. 

What has never changed are the ingredients in each loaf, the nutritional facts, the weight of the bread AND our commitment to purity and baking real bread! 

Thank you for trusting us to bake your family's daily bread. It is an honor and a privilege that we do not take lightly and we hope that even though you may experience a slight difference from time to time, that you feel confident when you consume our heirloom Spelt baked goods. 

Take care and stay safe!

Nicole
Berlin Natural Bakery 

Before we dive into this subject, I want to take a moment to apologize. I want to apologize because we're getting to a point in this series where we're all about shattering the illusion of bread (aka bread-like products) available today on grocery store shelves.

When you look at the ingredient panel on a loaf of conventional grocery store bread many of the ingredients are added to make the product look, taste, feel and smell like a real loaf of bread. What doess it say about the state of bread and the baking industry when many of the ingredients are used to provide the illusion that it is the bread of generations past?

Let's take a look at some of the big, bad ingredients found in bread that you need to be aware and cautious of.   

Bromide – aka Potassium Bromate  

Certainly the biggest and most controversial dough conditioner out there is bromide. It was first used in the 1960s to replace potassium iodate because bakers claim it provides more dependable results and makes the dough more elastic which makes it easy to use for commercial baking.

The problem(s) with bromate? It is an endocrine disrupter which messes with the thyroid’s ability to produce and use iodine. Consuming a constant amount of bromate (in your daily bread perhaps) may eventually create a thyroid hormone imbalance. It is also believed to play a role in many different kinds of cancers (specifically in the kidneys and thyroid), cause DNA damage and have harmful effects on digestion and gut health.

This dough conditioner is currently banned in Europe, Canada, Brazil and China. In 1991, California added Potassium Bromate to their Proposition 5 list which means that products containing the dough conditioner must carry a cancer warning on them.

This dough conditioner in not banned in the United States because (in theory) the amount of bromate in a finished product should be next to nothing - something like less than 20 parts per billion. However, if bromated flour isn't baked long enough or at a high enough temperature or if there is too much added - the end product will end up having MUCH higher amounts of bromate in it.

Anyone out there think that there is regular testing for bromate in a completed loaf of bread?  Or in fast food buns and flours?

Azodicarbonamide

Meet the additive widely and affectionately nicknamed "the yoga mat chemical" thanks to Subway when they announced back in 2014 that they were dropping the chemical. It earned this nickname because it's primary use is in plastic rubber products like flip flops and yoga mats. Sounds like just the ingredient you want in a loaf of bread, doesn't it?

This ingredient is often used in bread and baked goods because it makes dough more elastic and it bleaches flour. However, the trade off just doesn't seem worth it. Azodicarbonamide is known to increase the risk of asthma, allergies and skin problems. It also seems to heighten a person's allergic reaction to other ingredients in a food

This dough conditioner has been approved by the FDA for use in food in the US but Australia and many countries in Europe have banned it.

Experts around the world worry that it has not been adequately tested for the amount that people may be consuming. This concern is rooted in the discovery that over 130 well-known companies were found to use it including brands that use the phrases "natural" and "whole grain" on their products. So while a minute amount of this chemical is added to a loaf of bread - it's hard to see the cumulative effect this chemical could have on our health since so many products in grocery stores use it.

We also face the same insecurity as we do with potassium bromate - who's testing the end product  to make sure it's safe, being used properly and has the right amount in it?

DATEM - Diacetyl Tartaric Acid Esters of Monoglycerides   

This is a fairly controversial dough conditioner and there isn't a whole lot out there on it but there are a few things I have found that make it necessary to at least mention it.

This is a fairly common dough conditioner and emulsifier used to improve volume and uniformity. It also helps make the dough stronger and more durable which makes it easy to process in a high-stress commercial baking system. DATEM can also be used to replace lecithin in flour and can partially replace gluten.

It is a synthetic compound typically derived from soy, palm or canola oil but sometimes can be made from animal fats. DATEM can typically be found in breads, baked goods, energy bars, butter, non dairy creamer and packaged/canned frosting.

Here's where DATEM gets interesting: it is considered "safe" by the FDA (like all of the other ingredients above) however a study has come out that challenges that finding. A study in 2002 done on rats showed that DATEM caused "heart muscle fibrosis and adrenal overgrowth."

On top of that, Whole Foods considers it an "unacceptable ingredient" and has declared that it does not meet their Food Ingredient Quality Standards (here). Take a look in cyber space and you will find that DATEM is not endorsed by authorities in the natural health food world even though there's not a whole lot of information on it.

Could These Dough Conditioners and Additives Be Making Us Sick?    

We're at that familiar place again where the answer to this question all depends on who you ask and who you trust. Just like we've seen with modern wheat and vital wheat gluten - there are government agencies and regulators who will testify that these dough conditioners are 100% safe for human consumption.

But it's really hard to ignore the fact that many countries and even whole continents have banned some of the ingredients we're eating and feeding our families here in the US. It's also hard to ignore studies that show the potential for very serious health issues created by these added ingredients.

As far as we're concerned, it is not on our authority that you should rest when making your personal decisions on these ingredients. We just feel it is our responsibility to give you information and encourage you to do your own research and discover your own personal truth.

What to Know About Berlin Natural Bakery 

You are not going to find any Potassium Bromate, Azodicarbonamide or DATEM in our products.

One of the main reasons you will not find these (and ingredients like these) in our breads is because we are not mass producing our breads. We have highly skilled bakers who oversee our entire small batch baking process to ensure that we produce a high quality loaf of bread which means our dough does not need to be manipulated with added ingredients.

 When you see our ingredient labels, you'll realize that NOTHING is added that you and your grandparents can't easily recognize and pronounce.

Stay Tuned! 

As we've said from the beginning - added dough conditioners is simply another piece of this complex food puzzle. Next, we'll be talking about synthetic vitamins used in bread to replace the natural ones that are destroyed during the milling and refinement process in most baked goods. Stay tuned because we have even more bread illusions to shatter - coming up!!

Sources:

http://www.bustle.com/articles/55096-7-ingredients-banned-in-other-countries-that-are-legal-in-the-us
http://www.ewg.org/research/potassium-bromate
http://www.livescience.com/36206-truth-potassium-bromate-food-additive.html
http://www.forbes.com/sites/melaniehaiken/2014/02/27/what-is-the-yoga-mat-chemical-and-why-is-it-in-your-food/
http://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/2014/03/06/286886095/almost-500-foods-contain-the-yoga-mat-compound-should-we-care-keep
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/monica-reinagel-ms-ldn-cns/azodicarbonamide-subway_b_4770189.html
http://www.bakerpedia.com/ingredients/datem/
http://naturallysavvy.com/eat/scary-ingredients-used-in-bread-manufacturing
http://blog.fooducate.com/2012/06/29/five-bread-ingredients-you-absolutely-should-avoid-bread-miniseries-part-44/
http://www.sensiblebite.com/2012/09/emuslifiers-datem.html
http://realfoodforager.com/why-i-never-eat-commercial-bread/
http://abcnews.go.com/Lifestyle/Food/11-foods-banned-us/story?id=19457237#6
http://www.foodingredientsonline.com/doc/dough-and-bread-conditioners-0001
http://www.livestrong.com/slideshow/1011109-10-ingredients-always-avoid-bread-plus-7-bread-brands-bets/#slide=9
http://sweetsurprise.com/why-use-hfcs

Ah, GMOs. Most definitely a hot topic in our time and for good reason. There are two separate avenues when it comes to referring to hidden GMO ingredients - one deals with actual ingredients and the other deals more on a chemical level. This article will focus mainly on ingredients but we feel it is important to discuss hidden chemical components in GMO products because of the risk of allergic reactions.

In the 1990s, scientists tried to create a healthier soybean by inserting a gene from a brazil nut into it. For those of you highly or even deathly allergic to nuts - this kind of thing happening should alarm you especially since about 94% of soybeans are currently genetically modified according to GMOInside.org. Thankfully, these soybeans were tested on people who were sensitive to brazil nuts and those tests showed reactions to the soybeans which means that that specific GM soybean was never put on the market.

This kind of genetic modification poses a couple HUGE questions in regards to ingredient labeling. For instance, government agencies categorize genetically modified foods as the same as their non-genetically modified counter-parts.  Since that is the case, would companies be required to label (for example) a "Soy/Soybeans containing Brazil Nuts" as containing Nut Allergens? Or would it simply be called Soy?

To take this even further, by genetically modifying a crop, scientists are literally altering its genetic makeup which means that they may (and probably do) act differently on a chemical/cellular level. For instance, there is a higher amount of a common soy allergen in GM soy vs. the non GM variety. So people who may not have reacted to a low level of it in non GMO soy, may now have an allergic reaction. Additionally, it is common for genetically modified foods to contain new protein structures uncommon in non-GMO versions. These new proteins may trigger immune responses in people - aka an allergic reaction.

There is still research being done on the safety of genetically modified foods - which to us is INSANE since according to The Non-GMO Project 80% of processed foods in North American contain GMOs. That is a staggering percentage and it certainly should give us pause, especially when making our way through a grocery store.

What Are Common GMO Ingredients in Bread?

Switching gears here, let's talk about common GMO ingredients you will find in a loaf of bread.  One of the major GMO players is soy - as in soy flour, soy lecithin, and soybean oil. Soy lecithin is used for its ability to make bread dough easy to work with by making it less sticky. Soy flour has a bleaching affect on dough and it adds softness and volume to mass produced breads. And Soybean oil is used to extend shelf life, add flavor and make bread softer.  Another GMO ingredient to look out for in bread is cornstarch which is sometimes used for its thickening ability and as a component for bleaching flour.

You should also watch out for corn oil, vegetable oil, cottonseed oil, dextrose and high fructose corn syrup as they are likely to be genetically modified. And even trickier are enzymes commonly added to dough to make processing easier or to help create a good crust. Many of them are made with the help of genetically modified microorganisms - not that you can find this anywhere on a label.

Why Are Hidden GMOs Used in Bread?

GMO ingredients are used in breads (as you read above) for a ton of different reasons - for bread to seem thicker, for dough to be easier to work with, to improve bread coloring, to add nutritional value etc - but the #1 main reason they are used all ties into the fact that most breads are massed produced.

Mass producing a bread means there is no room for error. The dough HAS to be easy to work with. The dough CANNOT be sticky when making its way through machinery. The bread HAS to be shelf stable and able to last for weeks after it is purchased.  Above all else, it has to be consistent for mass producing to be possible.

It all comes down to the industrial revolution and our need to be better, faster and easier. Unfortunately, this value system may have some unintended consequences manifesting in the health of our nation and the rest of the world.

Could Hidden GMOs Be Making Us Sick?

Some people say yes, some say no, some say maybe and some say probably. 

If you Google "GMOs Bad" and "GMOs good" and other variations, you will find hundreds upon hundreds of articles that fight boldly on both sides. You have one side saying 100% yes that GMOs are bad while their opponents simply call people scientifically uneducated or paranoid.

Although we don't claim to have the answers, we do take a stand when it comes to labeling GMOs. We believe that everyone should have the right to know if GMOs are in their food and be given the opportunity to choose for themselves whether they consume them or not.

GMOs have been in our food supply since the mid 1990s and there are studies coming out all the time that should give us cause for concern. 

According to the American Academy of Environmental Medicine (an international organization that has been around since 1965), there have been several animal studies that show that consuming GMOs leads to an increased risk of  "infertility, immune dysregulation, accelerated aging, dysregulation of genes associated with cholesterol synthesis, insulin regulation, cell signaling, and protein formation, and changes in the liver, kidney, spleen and gastrointestinal system."  They go on to urge Physicians to educate their patients on GMOs, to recommend Non-GMO diets for all patients and to document their patients health changes if they cut out GMOs.

Anyone else find it interesting that an internationally known and respected organization comprised of Physicians would boldly urge their peers to keep an eye on GMOs and the role they may play on their patient's health?

GMOs may turn out to be perfectly healthy but until there are legitimate studies done on their safety - why not add a label to them so people can err on the side of caution? Maybe GMOs are the issue here but, maybe, like we've said all along, they simply play their part in the whole perfect storm that we find ourselves in today.

What Can You Do?

Stay up to date on current GMO issues and research that is coming out all of the time. Keep inspecting those ingredient panels and avoid questionable ingredients like soy, corn and cotton. When in doubt, find products with the Non-GMO Project Verified label.

If you find yourself stumped - feel free to ask your local health food store for help! We know that most natural health retailers are well informed and  more than willing to answer their customers' questions. They are a valuable resource so don't be shy!

What to Know About Berlin Natural Bakery 

We were actually the first bread line in the United States to become Non GMO Project Verified back in 2010.  We joined the Non GMO Project because strongly believe that people deserve the right to know what is and isn't in their daily bread.

Remember, none of our breads are mass produced which means we do not have to manipulate our dough with GMO ingredients like other bread companies do. We only do small batch baking meaning we bake 100 loaves of bread at a time with ingredients that you and your grandparents recognize.

Stay Tuned! 

Remember, hidden GMO ingredients  are simply one piece of a complicated puzzle. The next article in this series is going to focus on the modernization of wheat - what's happened to it and why you need to care.

Sources:
http://www.nongmoshoppingguide.com/brands/invisible-gm-ingredients.html
https://www.organicconsumers.org/news/genetically-engineered-foods-may-cause-rising-food-allergies
http://www.motherjones.com/environment/2013/08/what-are-gmos-and-why-should-i-care
http://www.nongmoproject.org/learn-more/gmos-and-your-family/
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/amanda-greene/soy-lecithin-why-is-it-in_b_2891780.html
http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/food-and-drink/features/the-shocking-truth-about-bread-413156.html
http://blog.fooducate.com/2010/11/04/the-top-20-ingredients-used-in-bread-miniseries-part-3/
http://recipes.howstuffworks.com/tools-and-techniques/cooking-with-cornstarch.htm
https://edubirdie.com/blog/new-scientific-studies-proving-gmos-can-be-harmful-to-human-health
http://www.gmo-compass.org/eng/grocery_shopping/processed_foods/28.gmos_bread_baked_goods.html
http://naturallysavvy.com/eat/scary-ingredients-used-in-bread-manufacturing

When you pick up a loaf of bread in the grocery store, more often than not you will find paragraphs of ingredients on the back panel. It seems bizarre that a loaf of bread would have so many ingredients when, in general, all you need to make a loaf of bread are a few basic, easily recognized items such as flour, yeast, water and salt.  

This series deals significantly in added ingredients - what they are and why they are used. So let's start with Vital Wheat Gluten since gluten is by far a hot button in our time.

Something you need to know is that Ancient Grain flours are notoriously hard to work. The chemical makeup of the gluten in ancient grains makes it different from that of modernized wheat(s).

Our Heirloom Spelt, for instance, does contain gluten but the gluten is very fragile. This makes it great for digestion purposes but hard for bakers to handle and even harder for companies to mass produce without added ingredients.

Vital Wheat Gluten is added to breads and other baked goods because it helps "provide the strength and elasticity necessary to endure the often brutal process of commercial mixing" (The New Yorker) Plus it helps produce a fluffy, light textured loaf of bread and has become somewhat of a crutch in the baking industry.

The presence of Vital Wheat Gluten in an Ancient Grain bread or even a "whole wheat" bread should arouse your suspicions on where and how it was produced. "It is not possible to manufacture, package, and ship large amounts of industrially made 'whole grain' bread without adding something to help strengthen the dough" (The New Yorker).

Not only does Vital Wheat Gluten keep a loaf of bread pretty and make it easy to mass produce - but it also increases shelf life and acts as a binder making it a hot commodity.

Vital wheat gluten is frequently found in breads, cereals, crackers and pastas but it also resides in foods you may not have suspected. It is staple used in the production of meat and meat substitutes. And a study in 2010, found gluten and other wheat byproducts in almost 1/3 of processed food products in grocery stores (Mother Jones). And that was nearly 6 years ago!  

Could Vital Wheat Gluten Be Making Us Sick? 

The short answer is: we just don't know..... yet.

Gluten is one of the most widely consumed proteins on Earth. Humans have been eating it for thousands of years but it definitely seems like in the last 50+ years we've had a rise in gluten sensitivity. This seems strange but if you consider the fact that companies have basically been adding a powerful, extra concentrated gluten to foods (and breads)  for mass producing purposes - suddenly it doesn't seem so odd. Unfortunately, the bread of today really isn't the bread of our grandparents.

There are currently studies on Vital Wheat Gluten and its effect on the immune system and on our bodies processes in general and you can bet we'll be keeping an eye out as new research becomes available.

What to Know About Berlin Natural Bakery 

You will NEVER find Vital Wheat Gluten as an ingredient in any of our products. In fact, our breads contain less than 7 ingredients with our Sourdough Spelt literally only containing 3 - whole spelt flour, water and sea salt.

None of our breads are mass produced. They are made in small batches of 100 loaves at a time with ingredients even your grandparents would recognize.

Stay Tuned! 

Remember, Vital Wheat Gluten is simply one piece of a complicated puzzle. We'll definitely be exploring the other facets of this mystery so stay tuned for next week's article which will feature where hidden GMOs might be in bread and other typical grocery store products.

Sources:
Atchison, Gates & Head (2010) Wheat as Food, Wheat As Industrial Substance; Comparative Geographies of transformation and mobility - http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0016718509001195
Christensen, Emma (2009) Vital Wheat Gluten: What Is It and When Should It Be Used? - http://www.thekitchn.com/vital-wheat-gluten-what-is-it-84612
Philpott, Tom (2015) 4 Surprising Facts About Wheat and Gluten - http://www.motherjones.com/tom-philpott/2015/03/wheat-gluten-fructans-intolerance
Specter, Michael (2014) Against The Grain - http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2014/11/03/grain

• Is it the Vital Wheat Gluten that is now being added to almost every bread on the grocery store shelves?
• Is it the hidden GMOs in the ingredients? 
• Is it the breeding methods that have taken place over time that has changed the genetic makeup of wheat that has led to tenfold increases in yields from that of only a century ago?
• Is it the rancidity that takes place in freshly ground whole grain flour that is stored unrefrigerated - or the chemical preservatives used to keep it from quickly turning rancid?
• Is it the dough conditioners and additives and artificial colors that are used to help create the illusion of a big bold healthy/hearty/whole grain loaf of bread?
• Is it the synthetic vitamins that are added to replace the ones destroyed in the refinement and milling process?
• Is it the hormone-like substance or “plant growth regulators” that are being applied to the wheat?
• Is it the collection bins sprayed with insecticides and or perhaps it’s the fumigation method (a toxic concentration of gas) used to remove any pests from the grain bins?
• Is it poor soil preparation or a lack of a good crop rotation plan?
• Is it the use of herbicides and pesticides?
• Is it the disappearance of the old fashioned stone grinding method that has been replaced by high speed steel roller mills?
• Is it the lack of using a cooled air drying system to dry the grain that causes the protein in the grain to become damaged?
• Is it the preservatives that are added to bread to increase shelf life?

So what is the answer? In reading through all of the above issues - we could make a case for any one of them but we suspect that the answer lies in the whole picture and not just in its individual components.

We find it amazing how people will simply pick one of the categories above and create an entire crusade based on that while completely discounting other major contributors. For example - GLUTEN is the big bad wolf hiding in everything you can find on a grocery store shelf and it is being portrayed as the ultimate villain against health. We are not so sure we agree with that but then, we know that not all gluten is created equal.

So over the next few months we are going to share with you everything we have learned about bread  - from how grain is grown, to added ingredients, to pesticides and herbicides to hidden GMOs and more. We're going to go through each question above, one by one to hopefully challenge your thinking and to create an open. honest dialog in the baking industry. We aim to educate and to help bring about some much needed change.

We will be sending these blogs out weekly so keep a look out for our emails or simply check out our blog at www.berlinnaturalbakery.com/blog/bnb. On Monday you will be getting our first installment featuring Vital Wheat Gluten - why it's frequently added to bread and why you should keep an eye out for it.

Let the journey begin!