Yes!! If you have Celiac disease or non- celiac gluten sensitivity.
This really is one of the biggest myths. The amount of times I have heard people say that something is gluten free so it’s healthy, or they have cut gluten from their diet and they feel so much better.
First of all, lets explain what gluten actually is.
Gluten is a group of proteins found in cereal grains. These proteins, called prolamins and glutelins, comprise 75–85% of the total protein in bread wheat. It gives dough its elasticity and makes bread soft and chewy.
In this day and age, for some reason and I cannot pinpoint when this happened, everyone started to blame their stomach issues on gluten. I came across a study whilst looking at some research and it tested 336 people who thought they had a gluten intolerance and put them on a gluten free diet. The results found that out of all those people on 27 of them had a gluten intolerance and 26 actually had celiac disease. The others had issues because of a number of different issues.
Stomach related issues can be stress (huge one), Irritable bowel syndrome, a diet change, a wheat allergy or another allergy such as lactose.
I have known many people remove gluten from their diet and have claimed that they feel better. That’s great. However, if you remove gluten from your diet you are also removing cakes, biscuits, all breads and other highly processed foods. Of course, they feel better, they have removed all the junk from their diet and probably replaced it with fresh and higher nutritious foods than they were eating before.
Other foods containing gluten are
Wheat Spelt Rye Barley Bread Pasta Cereals Beer Cakes, cookies, and pastries
Notice how most of these foods are the ones we tend to over consume? Could this be why we feel so bloated and tired after eating them, because we ate too much? Could it be not its not actually the gluten’s fault?
Are Gluten free versions better than normal versions of food?
Yes, if you have celiac disease or non-celiac gluten sensitivity. Otherwise absolutely not. They are very expensive and usually have extra additives added to make then taste similar.
If you do think you have a problem with gluten you should go to your doctor to be tested rather than just assuming it is gluten, you could be focusing your energy on the wrong problem when you could be fixing the right one.
It is believed that 0.5-15% of the western population may have a reaction of some kind to gluten, its not as high as you would think.