What Makes Sourdough Bread Unique?

Sourdough bread is a great healthy bread option.

Have you ever been warned that you should cut bread out of your diet because it’s full of carbohydrates, makes you gain weight, and is bad for your health? If you’re a bread lover, sourdough bread may be a great option.

Sourdough bread health benefits make it an excellent and healthy bread choice. Sourdough bread has a low glycemic index and can help keep your blood sugar and insulin levels lower, helping to prevent insulin resistance and diabetes.

What Makes Sourdough Bread Unique?

All bread is different. What grains are used, how the grains are processed, and the way the dough is prepared and baked can all affect the composition of bread products, and in turn, how they are metabolized in our bodies. This can affect how fast the bread moves through our digestive system once we eat it, and the way our body breaks down and absorbs the starches.

With sourdough, the grain, oftentimes wheat, is fermented with lactic acid bacteria and wild yeasts. In this process, the grain is metabolized by the bacteria and lactic acid is produced. Sourdough has reduced simple sugar content and high levels of lactic acid, which makes it unique from other types of bread.

Study Summary: Sourdough Bread Has a Lower Glycemic Response

Most bread products (especially white bread and highly processed bread) are loaded with carbohydrates and the starches are quickly digested. This produces a high glycemic response, meaning that your blood sugar spikes quickly after eating. Elevated glucose in the blood comes along with increased insulin concentrations which can be detrimental to health. But the fermentation process in sourdough lowers the glycemic index and makes it a great low GI bread.

A 2009 study looked into the difference between ingesting white bread, whole wheat bread, white sourdough bread, or whole grain wheat barley bread. Eating sourdough bread led to the lowest blood sugar and insulin levels. Furthermore, the beneficial effect of lowered glucose lasted beyond into the next meal, too.

Another study in prediabetic patients found that sourdough bread elicited significantly lower glucose and insulin levels than regular bread. The researchers concluded that a diet including a low gi bread such as sourdough bread might delay the evolution of insulin resistance into diabetes itself.

Even short bursts of high blood sugar can worsen insulin resistance and contribute to diabetes; preventing spikes in glucose by eating sourdough is one of the many benefits of sourdough bread.

Check Out Our Sourdough Options Here!

-University Healthy News Daily

This Is Not True With All Sourdough! Be Sure to Know What to Look For When Buying Sourdough!