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Gluten-free foods are expensive and nutritionally imbalanced than their gluten-containing counterparts

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Indian Journal of Gastroenterology Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

Objectives

Nutritional quality of gluten-free (GF) food products is very important, as patients with celiac disease consume these products for lifelong. There is paucity of data on the nutritional content and cost of GF food products compared with their gluten-containing (GC) counterparts from India (Asia).

Design

After a detailed market survey, packaged and labeled GF food products (n=485) and their packaged GC counterparts (n=790) from the supermarkets of Delhi (India) and e-commerce websites were included. Nutritional content and cost/100 g food (in US dollars) were calculated using the information on food label.

Results

Gluten-free food products were 232% (range: 118% to 376%) more expensive than their GC counterparts. Energy content of all GF food products was similar to their GC counterparts, except cereal-based snacks (GF: 445 kcal vs. GC: 510 kcal, p<0.001). The protein content was significantly lower in GF pasta and macaroni products (single-grain: GF: 6.5 g vs. GC:11. 5 g, p-0.002; multigrain: GF:7.6 g vs. GC:11.5 g, p-0.027), cereal flours (single-grain: GF: 7.6 g vs. GC: 12.3 g, p<0.001; multigrain: GF:10.9 g vs. GC: 14.1 g, p-0.009) and nutritional bars (GF: 21.81 g vs. GC:26 g, p-0.028) than their GC counterparts. Similarly, the dietary-fiber content of GF pasta and macaroni products, cereal flours, cereal premix and nutritional bars of GF foods was significantly lower than their GC counterparts. Gluten-free bread and confectionary items, biscuits and cookies and snacks had higher total fats and trans-fat content than their GC counterparts. Gluten-free cereal-based snacks had higher sodium content than their GC counterparts (GF: 820 mg vs. GC:670 mg; p<0.001).

Conclusion

GF foods are significantly more expensive, contain less protein and dietary fiber and higher fat, trans-fat and sodium than their GC counterparts. Strategies must be developed to reduce the cost and improve the nutritional profile of GF foods.

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Data availability

The data can be made available upon request from the corresponding author.

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Acknowledgements

We would like to acknowledge Indian Council of Agricultural Research, Indian Council of Medical Research, Department of Biotechnology for providing grants for research on Celiac Disease. We do acknowledge the University Grants Commission for providing Fellowship to Wajiha Mehtab. We would also like to acknowledge the shop owners of retail stores and supermarkets to allow us to conduct the market survey at their respective outlets.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Gastroenterology and Human Nutrition, All India Institute of Medical Sciences, Ansari Nagar, New Delhi, 110 029, India

    Wajiha Mehtab, Samagra Agarwal, Harsh Agarwal, Anam Ahmed, Shubham Prasad, Anjali Bhola, Namrata Singh, Vineet Ahuja & Govind K Makharia

  2. Department of Home Science, University of Delhi, New Delhi, 110 021, India

    Wajiha Mehtab

  3. Department of Gastroenterology, All India Institute of Medical Sciences, Jodhpur, 342 005, India

    Ashish Agarwal

  4. Department of Gastroenterology, Indira Gandhi Medical College, Shimla, 171 001, India

    Ashish Chauhan

  5. Department of Home Science, Lakshmibai College, University of Delhi, New Delhi, 110 052, India

    Anita Malhotra

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  1. Wajiha Mehtab
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Contributions

W. M.: market survey, procurement of food products, extraction of data, data analysis, drafting of manuscript; S. A.: statistical analysis; H. A.: extraction of data; A. Ahmed: extraction of data; A. Agarwal: data analysis, critical review of the paper; S. P.: data analysis, critical review of the paper; A. C.: data analysis, critical review of the paper; A. B.: critical review of the paper; N. S.: study supervision, critical review of the paper; V. A.: study supervision, critical review of the paper; A. M.: study supervision, critical review of the paper; G. K. M.: overall guarantor of the paper, designed the study concept, supervised the study, data analysis and finalization of the paper.

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Govind K Makharia.

Ethics declarations

Competing interests

WM, SA, HA, AA, AAg, SP, AC, AB, NS, VA, AM and GKM declare/s no competing interests.

Ethical approval

The study was approved by the Institutional Ethical Committee (Ref. No. IEC-192/07.4.2017, RP-14/2017).

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Not applicable (no human beings involved).

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All authors gave consent to the publication of the present paper. All authors approve that the manuscript represents honest work.

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All authors approved the final manuscript.

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The authors are solely responsible for the data and the contents of the paper. In no way, the Honorary Editor-in-Chief, Editorial Board Members, the Indian Society of Gastroenterology or the printer/publishers are responsible for the results/findings and content of this article.

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Mehtab, W., Agarwal, S., Agarwal, H. et al. Gluten-free foods are expensive and nutritionally imbalanced than their gluten-containing counterparts. Indian J Gastroenterol (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12664-024-01519-z

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