Does this gluten-free bread make me look fat?
Usually we’re all about fast forwarding the commercials after we’ve DVR’d the Housewives, but someone was slow on the draw (ahem, Aaron) and I wound up hearing something very interesting on the old telly yesterday. Have you seen this commercial?
Ummmm . . . .What the holy fuck?
So there’s this thing called Wellence™ (ohmygod,ohmygod,ohmygod) that Dow has invented to help bring the sexy back to gluten-free bread. Let’s take a look at Dow’s description:
Bringing back shape, structure and moistness with Wellence™ Gluten Free:
- Ensures cakes and breads achieve desired shape and volume and retain it in the oven and then when cooled
- Enables consistent dough handling
- Controls crumb structure and volume imparting an airy feeling
- Ensures enduring moistness by binding moisture into the food product
Okay, and there is this: “Wellence 47129 is manufactured from highly purified cellulose which is further modified to obtain the desired properties. The wood pulp used by the manufacturing plants for these products is a high purity, specialty cellulose designed for the conversion processes.”
Additionally, there is a discussion on the site about pesticides used around that wood pulp, and the consensus is, “Ehh, not too much.” Not too much pesticides soaked into that wood pulp you’re about to eat.
So.
That bread does look good though, doesn’t it? Like I’m-gonna’-chase-that-guy-down-and-have-my-way-with-his-bread, good. But yeah, since I’m more of the organic, less is more type of eater I would be totally afraid this chemical compound might have me growing another eye in the middle of my forehead. I can’t begin to tell you how much I don’t need that.
But let’s look on the bright side here, a huge corporation is concerned with our gluten-free bread quality. Progress?
Would you chow down on Wellence™?
Gluten is my Bitch 
I’ve heard that Wellence 47129 is people.
We just had a Gluten Free Expo here in the Big D and one of the conclusions I walked away with is how much I don’t miss bread. So, here’s a big (or appropriately little?) “meh” from me.
Besides which, yeah, just what we need: another weird man-made chemical in our food.
Since you asked, I’d say it’s more on the side of regress. I was kinda liking the fact that we had to turn to little mom-and-pops and weird off brands (notwithstanding the prices and limited availability). Partly, because, yaknow, those corporate assholes are just gonna get in there and find another way to ruin our food, get us addicted to other non-foods or near foods, lace it all with carcinogenic chemicals, etc, ad nauseam (which, as you know, to a celiac, really means something).
Oy.
Yep. To this.
I’m just waiting for gluten-free Wonder Bread. Then we will know that Celiacs have won. By losing.
And that’s the crazy thing: so much of gluten-free foods is all about trying to replicate the gluteny experience. If this is all we want, maybe we deserve soylent green.
As good as that bread looks, I can’t give my kid wood pulp with a dash of pesticides 🙂 Nice that they care to try, or more likely just hoping to cash in on the sad realitthor subpar GF bread. I’m so cynical, I know!
-Dana
Um I meant “reality of” not realitthor. Thx spellcheck.
Ha! Not cynical. Just conscious.
I heard this commercial last night and said, “Milk-a-WHA!? DOW is making gluten-free bread?! That is wrong on so many levels!”
Thanks… while I’ve been without bread in 3 weeks, and I’ve been craving just a slice slathered in the also-forbidden-butter, I don’t crave it enough to get a dash of pesticides as Celiac Kiddo says.
I second all the nay votes. Wood pulp is a little, okay a lot weird, not going into my mouth anytime soon, thank you very much!
Kinda gross, kinda awesome. I at least appreciate that folks are working on it, even if I don’t love the solution.
I agree. It’s hard to dog on someone trying to improve gluten-free, yet . . . ACK.
Unfortunately cellulose is in so many things already, this is just a much more highly refined form. Icecream, processed meats, commercial bread, most processed food. It’s bad, I don’t disagree, but really compared to the truly awful additives in most processed foods, this is pretty benign.
Sure it may be wood pulp but cinnamon is tree bark and cheese is just moldy rotten milk. I haven’t gotten to play around with this product but I’m not sure that it is worse than xanthan gum or guar. If it really works I think its worth consideration.
Great. Now I’m off cinnamon and cheese.
Hello all, A couple months ago, I contacted Dow and received a response from them, see below. I also contacted the bakery in Scotland and he sent me a couple bags of flour while he was traveling in the U.S.
I made bread and Pierogis with it. The bread still struggled to rise but it was better than before. I was hoping it would have been better than it actually was. The flour looked and flelt like other GF mixes.
Here is the response I received from Dow.
” Thank you for contacting the Dow Customer Information Group.
WELLENCE (TM) Gluten Free is not available directly to consumers, but instead sold to commercial bakers and food manufacturers to be incorporated into their products. If you are intersted in products that are made with WELLENCE (TM) Gluten Free, please see below.
Try for yourself, Wellence (TM) Gluten Free is used in the fine bakery products offered by Kinnikinnick Foods Soft Bread & Buns – http://www.kinnikinnick.com/. Or, those interested in trying gluten-free products to bake at home, try the delicious Bread & Pizza Dough premix offered at http://www.wheat-freebakerydirect.com. This company, based in Scotland, also offers gluten-free products for sale to wholesalers and distributors who might wish to stock these products in their local markets.
Kinnikinnick Foods Contact Us Information:
Toll Free: 1-877-503-4466”
OMG, I LOVE Kinnikinnick! I did not know I was eating Dow food. Well, it is pretty delicious.
if you have ever used any of the commercial pancake syrups like Log Cabin and Aunt Jemima then you have already eaten wood piulp since they all use cellulose (wood pulp) to thicken their syrups.