There are plenty of different types of sliced bread for sale in the supermarket - I tend to differentiate them by color - white and brown - but I was wondering whether brown bread is always wholwheat bread.
Is 12 grain, 7 grain, hearty oat…etc bread wholewheat?
Thakyou.
Well, I would imagine the “12 grain” part is a clue. Whole wheat would only be 1 grain bread. Here is a site which lists the ingredients for this bakery’s 12 grain bread.
I’m not sure about the various multi-grain breads, but I do know that you can’t just go by the color of the bread. There’s a difference between “wheat” bread and “whole wheat” bread, though they may look the same. It ain’t whole wheat unless it actually says “whole wheat” on the label. The stuff that’s just labeled “wheat bread” may be no more nutritious than soggy white bread, even though it’s brown.
The baker can put whatever they want in “12 grain bread”. I don’t think there’s an official definition of it (well, it would probably have to qualify as ‘bread’).
I’d say the chances of a ‘12 grain’ bread being primarily whole wheat flour are about the same as the chances of a regular loaf being primarily whole wheat. From Wonder or equivalent mass market brands, there’s a a very very small chance much whole wheat flour is used (even for the "wheat bread’ from Wonder, bleached white flour is the main ingredient), while from the small hippie bakery, there’s a much better chance they’re using whole wheat as the base.
I would guess very little oat bread uses very much whole wheat flour, but it’s up to the baker, of course.
The easy way to know of course, is to read the label. Legally, they do have to put ingredients there, in the order of importance, so see if ‘whole wheat flour’ is on the list an how close to the beginning it is.
If you’re lucky enough to be buying it at a bakery, where the bread isn’t individually bagged, then you can just ask the cashier.
They have all these new breads at the store I use that appear to be whole grain breads, usually with similar names to what you said. It can be very deceiving and annoying. Just because it says “12 grain” or “hearty oat” doesn’t mean it’s whole wheat bread. Just read the ingredients because the first ingredient will have the information you need. If you want whole grain, make sure it says whole wheat and don’t buy if it says “refined.”
Recently I’ve been looking at bread ingredients in stores for this very purpose. I find that the key word is not refined but rather enriched. If the first ingredient is “enriched wheat flour” whether bleached or unbleached, it’s not whole wheat. Yes, there may be a soupçon of whole wheat flour in it too, but chances are that the first ingredient listed makes up about 90% of the flour in the bread.