Nourished Magazine :: Wisdom to thrive by

Question: In your NT book you say that you “permit” the use of white flour in pie crusts and for use on surfaces for working with dough. Do you recommend white flour over whole wheat flour because it yields a better outcome or because its better nutritionally (no phytic acid in white flour)? - Debra

Answer: I allow the white flour as an exception because whole grain flour would need to be soaked and that does not make a good pie crust for sweet pies. The yoghurt dough is fine for quiche, etc (savory pies) but not for the sweet ones. For most people, a little white flour now and then (actually almost impossible to avoid) is not going to do any harm as long as the other elements of the diet are in place. However, for someone with celiac disease or who is very sick, they would want to really make an effort to avoid white flour.

Question: I would like to know more about a Japanese (or Asian) product you refer to in Nourishing Traditions that does the same thing as ‘whey’ to add lactic acid to fermented veg. I’m hoping its not of dairy origin - if that’s possible - because fermenting veg in whey renders it a ‘milk’ product and thus it can not be mixed with meat in any way by kosher consumers. Maybe lactic acid by it’s very nature must be of dairy origin ? I absolutely love Nourishing Traditions and am inspired to start fermenting etc. - Rebecca

Answer: I think you will find the information about Asian ferments in the book Wild Fermentation by Sandor Katz. But any of these fermented foods will develop lactic acid. (fermenting cabbage with salt will create lactic acid. You can also try Grainfields as a starter- Ed)

Question: My grandchild has developed GERD, at about the time he was started on solid food. His mother makes the baby food and adds no salt to it and they do not eat processed food. He is still being breast fed. (She is a doctor and afraid of hypertension). Is there a possible connection between the very low salt diet and the GERD? - Ann

Answer: Yes, the low salt diet could be contributing. Babies need salt for neurological development. I also suspect B12 deficiency as contributing to GERD. So the first thing I would recommend is some liver pate made with butter and plenty of salt. We have an article on GERD on our website.

Question: I wanted to ask about alcohol based/ artificial sweetners such as maititol & sorbitol & Splenda. If we do not digest them, do they still deplete nutrients? What health repercussions do they have? - Anna Rossinoff

Answer: We have an excellent article on these artificial sweeteners at The Weston A Price Foundation Website.

All of these artificial sweeteners have side effects–including weight gain– and the most important point is that they are not necessary. If is fine and healthy to use natural sweeteners such as unprocessed honey, maple syrup, dehydrated cane sugar juice, palm sugar etc in moderation in homemade desserts containing good fats. Diabetics can use stevia powder.

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Paraphrasing the report offered above reveals:

• The big money agenda behind the political wrangling it took to ‘convince’ FDA to allow aspartame to be sold. Donald Rumsfield, Ronald Reagan, Robert Shapiro, were all involved in pulling this one off. And all profited.
• Aspartame is a neurotoxic substance that has been associated with dizziness, visual impairment, severe muscle aches, numbing of extremities, pancreatitis, high blood pressure, retinal hemorrhaging, seizures and depression. It is suspected of causing birth defects and chemical disruptions in the brain.
• Saccharine was the substance that began the great corporation we know today as Monsanto.
• Sucralose (Splenda) has the fewest independent scientific tests to its credit of all non-nutritive sweeteners. It is bad for diabetics and cause sshrinking of the thymus gland (up to 40 percent shrinkage), enlargement of the liver and kidneys, decreased red blood cell count, extension of gestational periods in pregnancy, decreased fetal body weights and placental weights, and diarrhea. (this is in mice, what does it do to humans? We’ll find out I suppose). Prolonged storage, particularly at high temperatures and low pH, causes sucralose to break down into other chemicals which have never been tested on humans. Additionally, sucralose may contain up to 2 percent of various impurities, such as heavy metals, arsenic, triphenilphosphine oxide, methanol, chlorinated disaccharides and chlorinated monosaccharides.
• Sugar alcohols like Sorbitol and Xylitol may indeed occur in nature but one single factor from a natural food item is being isolated from its normal co-constituents and consumed at levels that are difficult to obtain when eating the food item itself. Rarely, if ever, does this situation lend itself to good health. While sugar alcohols are certainly the lesser of two evils when compared to the non-nutritive sweeteners, they should be consumed with prudence if at all. There are better choices.
• Some sweeteners that are said to be excreted aren’t totally, being found in intestinal tissues. Sugar alcohols are broken down and stimulate the growth of unfriendly bacteria.

About the Author...

Sally Fallon is founding president of the Weston A Price Foundation, a non-profit nutrition education foundation with over 400 local chapters and 9000 members. She is also the founder of A Campaign for Real Milk, which has as its goal universal access to clean raw milk from pasture-fed animals. Author of the best-selling cookbook Nourishing Traditions and also of Eat Fat Lose Fat (Penguin), both with Mary G. Enig, Phd, Sally has a encyclopedic knowledge of modern nutritional science as well as ancient food ways. Her grasp on the work of Weston Price is breath taking and her passion for health freedom, inspiring. In each edition of Nourished Magazine Sally answers your questions about nutrition, health, food and medical politics. Send us an email with your question and we'll put it to her.