More thoughts on gluten-free Cheerios

More thoughts on gluten-free Cheerios

A growing number of manufacturers and suppliers of “gluten-free” oats are using optical and/or mechanical sorting to clean oats at the back end of production.  What these manufacturers such as General Mills should keep in mind is that the celiac disease community has been advised for over 10 years to eat only those oats grown under a purity protocol. Consumers are now being asked by some manufacturers to put aside this advice. However, it is not enough for manufacturers to simply say their proprietary process is better than a purity protocol. These companies must gain the trust of the celiac disease community.

Manufacturers using mechanical and/or optical sorting could learn a few lessons from the suppliers of specially produced oats. When these oats came on the scene, many in the celiac disease community were avoiding oats because of concerns about contamination with wheat, barley, and rye. The gluten-free oat suppliers proceeded to provide consumers with an abundance of information about the steps they were taking to minimize contamination. They released their testing protocols and also certified their products as gluten-free. You can read about the protocol for Gluten Free Harvest oats by clicking HERE.

The manufacturers using optical and/or mechanical sorting to clean contaminated oats can and should do the same.

As discussed in prior posts, when “gluten-free” Cheerios are available commercially, Gluten Free Watchdog will be sending multiple lots to the lab for testing. The entire box of product will be ground and multiple extractions tested. This should provide consumers with a good picture of the gluten level in this product. We are also in the processes of testing other brands using a cleaning process to produce “gluten-free” oats.

For more information about oats please click HERE

© Copyright May 2015 by Tricia Thompson, MS, RD for Gluten Free Watchdog. All Rights Reserved.

 

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