The Future Of Wheat Gluten

Wheat gluten is widely used in the United States even though most of are not even familiar with it. This is both good and bad. Wheat gluten has had several contamination issues in recent months from wheat gluten imported from China. The exact future of wheat gluten is uncertain, but one thing remains certain, its use will continue to grow.

In the United States we use wheat gluten daily in many ways that most people are unaware of. With the recent trends to create healthier eating habits and foods, many food manufactures have added wheat gluten into their products such as high fiber breads. The elastic consistency of gluten also makes it extremely useful in processed meat products to give that meaty and fibrous texture when chewed. As out processed food consumption continues to rise, food manufacturers continue to look for healthy and cheap alternatives to meat to be used as filler product. Wheat gluten has a long history as being used as an alternative to meat in the Asian culture where it is at least as common as tofu, if not more so. Here in the United States, you won't likely find wheat gluten for sale at your local supermarket, but you will find it if you go to your local health food store or especially in the Asian health food stores. Wheat gluten also has non-food uses which continue to grow. Contamination of wheat gluten has forced suppliers to find alternative uses for gluten that is contaminated beyond levels acceptable for human consumption. The result being that much of it has been redirected into pet and animal food industries where contamination tolerances are much higher. As wheat gluten is commonly used as a meat substitute, it is easy to understand how expanding its usage to the pet industry makes good sense for manufacturers and consumers alike. The pet industry is huge in the United States and there are no signs that it is slowing down. The future of wheat gluten looks to be quite solid in this industry. There are other non-food uses of wheat gluten that you may or may not be aware of. Gluten has a very elastic property that makes it a natural staple of chewing gum, for example. It is also used for its elasticity and adhesion properties in various glue products, especially paper mache and wall paper products as well as other paper related glues and adhesives.

The future of wheat gluten remains strong and growing in the US, despite some of the recent contamination related issues stemming from Chinese imported gluten. In the future, look for two strong trends to continue. One will be the further industrial refinement process to yield uncontaminated wheat gluten. This process is already being practiced in several companies here in the US and it will only continue to grow in popularity as the negative news coverage taints the image of the industry with news of contamination. But the other trend maybe even more important to the future of wheat gluten because it will involve the "quiet" continued usage and growth of how to effectively use contaminated gluten in non-food related products. Either way, wheat gluten is not going away - it's here to stay.