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February 08, 2022

Flour-based foods contain fibre!

That's the message at the heart of heart of UK Flour Millers' annual Fibre February campaign, which is launched again this month.

Image credit: Mark Bonica on Flickr
(CC BY 2.0)
Following the success of last year's campaign, this month people are being encouraged to think about increasing their fibre intake by making small swaps – such as amending recipes to include wholemeal flour, choosing 50:50, seeded or wholemeal bread products.

A registered nutritionist will bring their expertise to the campaign, and three online influencers will each create video content of an existing FAB Flour recipe.

There will also be weekly competitions on Twitter, and to help spread the word in school UK Flour Millers have partnered with Food: A Fact of Life, who have written dedicated classroom resources on fibre, and with the Food Teacher's Centre, who will be running a social media campaign on their Facebook page to help promote the event and the resources.

Priya Nicholas, UK Flour Millers communications manager, says, 'Once again we're pulling out all the stops to increase the public's awareness and consumption of fibre in their everyday flour-based products.

'We're particularly delighted to be working with partners who can effectively bring the message into schools, while working with social media influencers is a great way of showing that baking with flour is a fun way of increasing fibre intake.'

Meanwhile the launch of Fibre February coincided with a webinar, hosted by UK Flour Millers, which highlighted ongoing research aimed at increasing the amount of fibre in white bread.

A slice of typical white bread has about 1g of fibre, whereas wholemeal has about 3g. But Peter Shewry, a project leader at research institute Rothamsted, explained how his team are working to increase the current level of fibre from four percent to six percent through breeding techniques rather than genetic engineering.

'Around 49 percent of bread bought in the UK is white bread, compared with just five percent wholemeal,' he says. 'This is perfectly understandable, because it's cheap, has a long shelf life, and consumers prefer the taste.

'But while you can't change what people eat, we've been looking at increasing the fibre content of white bread without transforming it into something totally different which consumers won't buy or increasing the price.

'We've developed genetic markers that can easily be used by plant breeders to identify which individual wheat plants have the high fibre genes. This will allow them to incorporate the high fibre into elite wheat lines – and opens the possibility of significant increases in dietary fibre intake for everyone.'

The new flour makes a quality white loaf – but with all the added health benefits that come from eating wholemeal bread, including reduced cancer, diabetes and obesity risks. It also provides an alternative to manufacturers producing loaves that contain both white and wholemeal flours, or have fibre from other sources added.

For more information about the UK Flour Millers visit the website, HERE. 

The Global Miller
This blog is maintained by The Global Miller staff and is supported by the magazine Milling and Grain
which is published by Perendale Publishers Limited.

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