GMO and Gluten Free Foods

I find it very annoying when people say, or worse yet, post on the web, that switching to Gluten Free is the healthiest thing they can do — regardless of what they eat.  There are plenty of bad gluten free foods out there that are far from healthy.   Of course, for us gluten intolerant or celiac folks , we don’t have a choice to whether or not we eat gluten.  But how about the QUALITY of the Gluten Free foods you are eating.  Did you know that LOTS of Gluten Free foods contain GMO.

GMO is a genetically modified organism  —  an organism whose genetic material has been altered using genetic engineering techniques.  If you have been following the news, studies have shown that GMO food can cause an array of nasty side effects including cancer and premature death.

Now, back to how Gluten Free foods contain GMOs.  If you don’t eat wheat, barley or rye, what is the next most common gluten free grain?  Corn!  And corn is the most likely grain to be GMO.

The following article by Mike Adams, editor of Natural News, explains further:

(NaturalNews) In the wake of all the recent revelations about the dangers of GMOs, a special warning needs to go out to all those health-conscious consumers buying “gluten-free” foods. As it turns out, most “gluten-free” foods sold in the USA contain genetically modified organisms.

Why is this so? Because the primary ingredient in most gluten-free foods is corn. And most corn-based foods are made with genetically modified corn. Around 85% of the conventional corn grown in the USA is genetically modified corn, and that corn is engineered to produce its own deadly insecticide right inside every grain.

When GM corn is harvested and made into gluten-free foods, the insecticide stays with it and resides in the gluten-free food. As a result, people who are buying gluten-free are often exposing themselves to the risk of toxicity from GM corn.

As Mike points out, the best way to avoid GMO and still eat corn based foods is to find  certified organic corn products.

Personally, my husband and I had big corn chip and taco eaters.  What do we do?  Costco carries a brand of organic corn chips that we buy regularly (sorry don’t remember the brand, but it is in a big brown bag).  Food for Life Brand makes a delicious organic sprouted corn tortillas that we use for our tacos — which you could also cut up and fry into chips.

Mike also suggests to check the labels on all the food you buy.  Unfortunately, companies are not required to put GMO ingredients on the label, so look for organic corn products.  (Watch the Proposition 37 Ballot Measure coming up in California.  Passage of this measure could be the starting point for a change in the labeling laws.) Mike says …

Do the ingredients include corn? Corn syrup? Maltodextrin? These are all corn derivatives, and if they’re not USDA organic, they’re likely to be genetically modified.Of course, this is NOT true outside the USA. GMOs are already banned in many countries, and GMO labeling laws exist in prominent nations around the world. This article is written solely for American consumers who remain inundated with genetically modified corn grown from the evil seed of Monsanto and other biotech seed suppliers.