Concerned about cholesterol levels?
Want to reduce risk of heart disease and diabetes?
Looking for sustained weight loss?
Try a barley tortilla.
It’s actually not quite that simple, but Nancy Ames, a Winnipeg-based cereal scientist with Agriculture Canada, is looking into the role that barley-based food – including tortillas – can play in improving human health.
Barley is not common in most people’s diets, other than maybe the occasional bowl of beef and barley soup, but it’s beneficial for human health.
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It’s rich in beta glucans, a type of carbohydrate that plays a role in regulating levels of cholesterol and glucose.
It’s high in fibre and a good source of certain vitamins and antioxidants.
It also has a low glycemic index, meaning its carbohydrates are absorbed slowly, which helps diabetics avoid fluctuations in blood sugar levels.
That’s where Ames’ current work is focused.
“We’ve formulated different barley tortillas containing specific types and levels of fibre to evaluate their effect on glycemic response in a human clinical nutrition trial currently being conducted at the University of Manitoba,” Ames said in a news release issued by the Western Grains Research Foundation, which is funding the research.
In an interview, she said she hopes the glycemic index research project will be completed by the end of the year.
Why tortillas?
Ames has been looking at new food uses for barley for several years, making use of new varieties with unique starch and beta glucan properties.
When Ames mixed the flour from some of those new varieties with water, the resulting dough turned out to be stretchable, which provided a moment of inspiration.
“The main food that occurred to me when I saw this dough was a tortilla because I recognized that this was a limitation in the tortillas I had seen on the market,” she said.
Selecting the right barley variety is the key to producing a soft, pliable tortilla with good taste and colour, she added.
Ames and her colleagues have evaluated 30 barley cultivars and genotypes for tortilla quality and now have a good idea of the necessary characteristics. The product is made from whole grain flour and its ingredients are just barley and water, with no additives.
She has also developed a crunchy barley chip similar to a tortilla chip. It rated highly in consumer tests for flavour and texture but failed to match the preferred yellow colour of the traditional corn chip.
Ames has acquired a U.S. patent on her products, which, along with a health claim, should make them more attractive to potential industrial developers because they would know they would have exclusive rights to resulting products or processes.
She is also part of a group working to register a health claim for barley with Health Canada. An application was sent in earlier this year.
Ames said educating consumers on the nutritional benefits of barley, combined with the development of new food uses, could create new demand and market opportunities for the crop.
