What Proportion / Percentage Of Foods Are Gluten?

[justinclarke]

Hi,

I'm trying to figure out whether I am intollerant to gluten or not and I was looking down the "Unsafe Gluten-Free Food List (Unsafe Ingredients)" article (https://www.celiac.com/articles/182/1/Unsaf...ents/Page1.html) and wondering exactly how much gluten is in the foods / ingredients listed there.

Take for example plain old wheat flour, how much gluten is in that? 95%, 50%, 30% gluten?

How about Pasta, is that 80% gluten? 15% gluten?

How about Couscous, is that 90% gluten? 30% gluten?

Also something like Teriyaki Sauce, is that 40% gluten? 5% gluten? As obviously you only consume a small amount of Teriyaki Sauce compared to Pasta or Couscous so the different amounts of gluten in each would be helpful to know.

For example if Teriyaki Sauce is only 5% gluten then maybe this is still ok to consume for most sufferers compared to if it was 95% gluten.

So does anyone know the percentage of gluten that are in the foods / ingredients on that list, and can add that alongside those foods / ingredients?

Thanks, Justin.

[darlindeb25]

I honestly do not think anyone has figured that out. If you are gluten intolerant, any gluten is too much gluten. Anything made with flour..breads, pasta, crackers, cookies, cakes...all has too much gluten. As far as that goes, "gluten free" labeled foods have too much gluten for lots of gluten intolerant people. The US doesn't actually have a standard set, they do say anything with less than 20ppm of gluten is ok...but, that is debatable. Not eveyone can handle 20ppm, or 100ppm, or even 5ppm.

[Jestgar]

Echoing what Deb said, I think most people will tell you that even a tiny bit makes them feel ill, so it doesn't really matter what the percentage is.

[ravenwoodglass]

I agree with the others, any amount is too much. With celiac it is not the amount of gluten consumed that makes us sick it is the antibody reaction that it causes. Those antibodies are activated with even a tiny amount of a gluten grain.

[justinclarke]

OK thanks for your answers. I was just thinking that there were different levels of sensitivity etc. So if you ate 1 biscuit you may be fine, but then if you ate a whole packet, then that would be too much to handle.

I guess I haven't got a gluten intolerance then as I can eat foods with gluten in and have no reaction. but then sometimes I eat a random meal and I get the same symptoms as celiac disease. I will have to keep searching to the source of my problems!

Thanks.

[robertfarquharson]

Hi,

I'm trying to figure out whether I am intollerant to gluten or not and I was looking down the "Unsafe Gluten-Free Food List (Unsafe Ingredients)" article (https://www.celiac.com/articles/182/1/Unsaf...ents/Page1.html) and wondering exactly how much gluten is in the foods / ingredients listed there.

Take for example plain old wheat flour, how much gluten is in that? 95%, 50%, 30% gluten?

How about Pasta, is that 80% gluten? 15% gluten?

How about Couscous, is that 90% gluten? 30% gluten?

Also something like Teriyaki Sauce, is that 40% gluten? 5% gluten? As obviously you only consume a small amount of Teriyaki Sauce compared to Pasta or Couscous so the different amounts of gluten in each would be helpful to know.

For example if Teriyaki Sauce is only 5% gluten then maybe this is still ok to consume for most sufferers compared to if it was 95% gluten.

So does anyone know the percentage of gluten that are in the foods / ingredients on that list, and can add that alongside those foods / ingredients?

Thanks, Justin.

Yes, this is my question too. All answers so far mention cases for those who are completely gluten intolerant. In my case I just want to cut down on gluten intake, so I would like to make an informed desision. With percentages or PPM count of different products this would be possible. So far I have not seen an answer for this. As Darlindeb25 said, maybe there just are no records of this. With all the hype about gluten you'd think some scientist could give gluten ratings on different products. For example, I would like to rate regular oats (yes-contaminated as they are called) agains rye, barley and wheat. If wheat were 30% gluten and contaminated oats were 1% then I would know that I could eat 30 times more oats for the wheat I eliminate from my diet. Can anyone help with this info?

 

Thanks, Rob

[psawyer]

Rob, this topic is more that four years old, and those who participated in it back then have mostly moved on.

[GFinDC]

Hi Rob,

 

In the USA, an easy way to get a rough idea of the preponderance of gluten in a product is to look at the ingredient list.  The ingredients are listed in descending order with the largest amount first.  So if wheat flour is the first ingredient you can figure the product is mostly wheat flour (gluten).  Another simple way to look at it is that most baked goods, breads, cookies, pizza etc are very high gluten content.  They are made from flour so that 's easy to figure.

 

If you are just trying to cut down, look for products where wheat, rye, barley or malt are among the last ingredients listed.  Or are not listed at all.  Whole foods are a good way  to go for naturally gluten-free foods.  Versus processed foods which often have gluten as fillers or binding or emulsifying agents.