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I have been reading the excellent and very interesting reports on the Tampere
conference. One thing that intrigued me (there were more, but this one most)
was the new codex alimentarium. At first glance this seemed similar to the
old norm (both 10 mg per 100g), but looking better it is 10 mg gluten in
stead of 10 mg gliadine (=20 mg gluten), and it is per 100g protein,
in stead of per 100g dry matter. I have been doing some calculations to see
what this means in practise, using my wheatstarch based *GF* breadmix as an
example. The breadmix contains 3 mg gliadin = 6 mg gluten per 100g (information
from the manifacturer) and thus its gluten content is more than 3 times under
the current codex alimentarius. It contains 6,5 g protein per 100g (on the
package) and thus almost 100 mg gluten per 100 g protein, thus almost 10 times
above the new codex alimentarius.
 
Could someone comment on whether I got this right? Is this new standard only
being discussed, or is it certain that it will replace the current value of
the codex alimentarius? When will this be?
 
Finally, to prevent you from asking me this question: Why do I use
this stuff anyway? Answer: It just bakes such a marvelous bread. I tried
several real GF breadmixes, as I figured out before that the gluten content is
relatively high. But all real GF breads seem to go stale and dry the moment
they are cold. While this bread stays elastic. Not as much as gluten bread,
but on a scale from 0 (GF) to 10 (gluten) I give it 5 to 6. My fear is that
this property is due to the small amount of gluten in this mix, and thus not
transferable to real GF mixes.
 
In the report on Tampere there was some remark on patients not liking it
(the stricter codex alimentarius). Maybe this is why, although personally
I am all in favour of a stricter standard.
 
Who knows more about this?
 
Hendriek Boshuizen
in Utrecht, the Netherlands