Sir, – Thanks to John McKenna ("The best thing since sliced bread? Ban the sliced pan", Health + Family, October 21st) for highlighting the nutritional deficiencies of white bread. I am old enough to remember the coarse brown bread we all had to eat during the war years when white flower was in short supply. Eating it took some getting used to.
We were too young to appreciate the health benefits of wholemeal bread, and it is fair to say our poor parents were not up to speed on nutritional information, either. Unknown to us was the fact that after the white flour was extracted from the grain the residue, which contains the wheat germ, was used as animal feed. Nutritionally, the animals were better fed than we were!
Up to the mid-1800s wheat was ground between large stone wheels. These could only produce flour that was not fully white because stonegrinding was unable to remove the germ which contains all the nutrients in the grain. With the advent of steel rollers, white flour came into being. The result was white bread. However, it was more expensive to produce. Only the well-off could afford to buy it and the poor continued to buy the coarse brown variety.
Older readers will remember with fondness the wholemeal small loaf that Bewley’s produced in the 1950s. Two slices from this delicious brown loaf at breakfast kept one satisfied well up to lunchtime. With white bread one is likely to end up full of wind by mid-morning! – Yours, etc,
BRENDAN M REDMOND,
Terenure,
Dublin 6W.