While many dieters cut out bread, pasta, cereal, and rice, eliminating an entire food group, like healthy bread, from your diet, isn’t sustainable long term. When eating these foods, choose whole grains. Here’s how to identify the healthiest bread while shopping at the grocery store.
Choose Products With 100% on the Label
Check labels for phrases like 100% whole grains or 100% whole wheat, which should be written on the front of the package. 100% whole grain means that all three parts of the grain including the bran, germ, and starchy endosperm, have been used to make the bread.
Look at the Ingredients
Make sure your read the fine print. The ingredients are listed by weight with the first one making up the most of the product. Look for 100% whole wheat flour, 100% while grain flour, whole wheat flour, whole grain flour, etc. If other flours are listed, the product isn’t 100% whole grain. Words like enriched flour, pearled barley, degerminated, bran, or wheat germ mean the product isn’t 100% whole grain. In general, the shorter the list the better. Be on the lookout for added sugars that can appear under the names corn syrup, high fructose corn syrup, molasses, fructose, dextrose, galactose, honey, cane sugar, etc.
Look at the Nutrition Facts
One hundred percent whole grain braid usually has more fiber and protein than white bread. This keeps you feeling full longer and your blood sugar steady.
Don’t Pay Attention to Color
Some manufacturers add molasses or caramel food coloring to refined white breads to make them appear to be wheat breads. Also, some wheats that are used for 100% whole white bread are white.
