King Arthur bread flour now contains a highly-processed fungal additive

For anyone using King Arthur bread flour, you should know that the company now adds to it a lab-processed enzyme called fungal alpha-amylase.

If you suffer from an autoimmune condition or are like me, a sort of "canary in the coal mine" who reacts negatively to food additives, you might want to avoid using it. Their bread flour ruined my three-year-old sourdough start, not to mention my week!

More info here:

Sourdough woe

There's also a narrated version of this report here:

Sourdough woe podcast version

That's really disappointing. For those of us that suffer from reactive type bodies (for whatever reason), it seems harder and harder to avoid unnecessary additives. (One of the science articles I read, seemed to think it made no difference either.)

Hi, Lisa

When it says "Enzymes or Malted Barley Flour" does the company mean the bread flour could contain either of those?

I went to their website though I could not tell if this is only an issue with bread flour.

Y'all.  Call King Arthur flour. Call their management!  We need a ton of people to call them and tell them to take the enzyme OUT!  It's isn't needed. We don't want it!!!  The only way to create change is to speak up, speak out, and OFTEN!

Anne Miller, hi.  I just got off the phone with King Arthur Flour.  I explained to the person that took the call that adding a lab-made chemical additive to a flour that is labeled 'ORGANIC' is NOT organic.  It is the opposite of organic.  I told her that no one that purchases their organic flours wants this 'fungal additive' in their organic flour.  We buy organic flour and spend a lot more for it because we want a clean flour without additives!   The person I spoke to, Maria, didn't say anything much, mostly just listened in silence, and repeated what she is told to say, such as that the additive is 'certified organic'.  I explained to her that anything made in a lab is the opposite of organic.  When I asked who makes these decisions she said that King Arthur is employee-owned and that they take a vote on decisions (not sure if those were the exact words, but something to that effect, they all have a voice in the decisions).  

I told her that this is not acceptable and that there is a lot of talk about it online and there will be more talk coming online. People need to be made aware and especially...people need to contact King Arthur and request that they remove this fungal un-healthy additive from their organic flours.  

Regarding your question about whether it is barley flour or the enzyme additive, I believe it is an either/or.  I thought that the additive was only in the organic bread flour but I currently have an organic AP bag in the house that lists 'enzyme or barley malt flour' and an organic bread flour bag that doesn't mention the enzyme, just barley malt flour.  

Hopefully, they will remove the enzyme from their organic flours. Their reputation has been so good for so many decades but this is the sort of thing that will destroy that good reputation amongst the customers that buy organic flour to avoid harmful additives.

Please talk this up on social media and everywhere possible.  People need to be made aware.  

Thank you, Lisa, for your article.

I do not tend to by my microbes when they can be cultured from wild sources, but the question I would ask is what exactly is the “processing” used to make fungal alpha amylase, and what are the effects, intended or collateral? To play devil’s advocate, aren’t microbes, like those in EM or brewer’s yeast, often processed (which could just mean carefully cultured and tested for purity) for use in organic and regenerative agriculture? (I wonder what John Kempf would know or say about this). To some extent, how is what they are doing qualitatively different and worse than taking to a commercial scale the homebrewing of microbes and their byproducts, like beer for ethanol, apple cider for vinegar, or compost teas for more microbes and their byproducts? Can nothing made in a brewery, which is very similar to a lab in many ways, be called organic?

I often like wild brews with wild yeast, but will sometimes but a particular wine or beer brewing yeast for a consistent flavor in the end product. How is this different? The lack of transparency seems to be the main problem to me.

You've made some good suggestions, Ben.  Would you consider calling King Arthur to speak with them about some of the questions you have presented? Of great importance is the first question you posed... what exactly is the “processing” used to make fungal alpha amylase, and what are the effects, intended or collateral?
I will never agree with their argument that their Frankenlab concoction is qualified to be labeled 'organic'.  Synthetic/lab-made is the exact opposite of the definition of organic.  Bottom line is that it is just not necessary and their customer base does not want fungus in their flour, in their food, destroying their health. So WHO suggested it and WHY?   This is where lack of transparency is a real problem.  Why put this additive in organic flour when there is no reason to and when to do so serves only to make the product non-organic, unhealthy, dangerous to consume for some folks and thereby not considered edible by their organic flour customer base.

I am not sure that calling their customer service is really that effective.

The person answering the phone may not even be in Vermont.

Look at their website for their products and for their blog.

Is there a place to leave feedback?

Is there a place to report that they might not be using all organic items in the products?

Make a list of all the products that have these "enzymes", be sure to write feedback for all these products.

Make s list of the results that you got when you used these products.

I'm confused (I'm also an avid baker and sell my wares to the permies.)  I use KAF Organic Bread Flour, and I can see the "Enzyme*" additive on the ingredients.  Researching the Aspergillus oryzae enzyme, I see that it's also the same as kōji mold, used to make a lot of different products including soy sauce and saki.  On the outside, these substances seem eminently natural and well-accepted by most.  

I do not understand where this is a problem and hoping for some enlightenment, as I want to make the best (healthiest) bread possible.  At what point in the 'processing' does this otherwise naturally occurring mold turn into a harmful substance?  

Thanks.

Food sensitivities are no joke.

I used to work in a hospital's kitchen cooking for both patients and visitors, as well as having to deal with some allergies/sensitivities that I could not appreciate.

Do you know how much food is preserved with citric acid? I didn't until someone had a sensitivity and I had to read all my labels. I was dumbfounded!

Mass produced food is going to contain additives for a variety of reasons and some of them are due to regulation plain and simple. This however does not prevent mistakes from happening and contaminated foodstuffs being shipped out and potentially not caught.

My biggest recommendation is to look into local farmer ground flours or get a grain mill yourself. That is the best way to be sure what is in the product that you have. Then you have better control of what you consume.

Isn’t yeast a kind of fungus?

It seems to me that the issue is not just the specific additive. Even if it's organically produced, when people buy "King Arthur Flour" they think they're getting plain flour. Wheat ground up to a powder, with more or less of the bran and germ retained or removed. That's all.

If their additive is so great, let them market an improved bread flour with it. But please still sell just plain flour.

Since this is such an interesting discussion, I asked Mr. Google what is "fungal alpha-amylase" given by Lisa in her post above.

It seems that this is an Enzyme used by brewers to aid the conversion of grain starch into fermentable sugars.

There is also a Wikipedia article on this enzyme

It is the major form of amylase found in humans and other mammals. It is also present in seeds containing starch as a food reserve, and is secreted by many fungi.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%CE%91-Amylase

Rebecca Norman wrote:It seems to me that the issue is not just the specific additive. Even if it's organically produced, when people buy "King Arthur Flour" they think they're getting plain flour. Wheat ground up to a powder, with more or less of the bran and germ retained or removed. That's all.

If their additive is so great, let them market an improved bread flour with it. But please still sell just plain flour.

100% agree.  I don't think the actual substance is bad, it's a naturally occurring enzyme.  We wouldn't have life on Earth without those biocatalysts.  But if you're going to add it, tell me.  

I don't believe that enzyme is in all of the King Arthur Flours.

Maybe only the one posted above.

I went to the website and looked at lots of the different flours.

Unfortunately, I could not get the pictures to enlarge enough to be sure that disclaimers were on the ones I looked at.

I believe a quick call to them might answer that question.

My wife found that at least some version of KAF bread flour has barley in it to aid fermentation. My wife is the baker in the house, but I know In fermenting for beer, nutrients like these are very helpful in helping the yeast do their work. Barley seems to naturally have abundant nutrients for the yeast to work with. I do love spent brewing barley in bread too.

I've never used this flour...we grind organic wheat berries but what is striking to me is the "safe handling" instructions at the bottom of the label Lisa posted.  
That alone would keep me from using this flour.

How could you be comfortable kneading bread bare handed and especially the standard cookie dough treat with the grandkids?

Out of curiosity, I looked around for some clue about USDA organic standards for enzymes, and found a package of reviews of barley malt enzyme, generally agreeing that it's natural and "non-synthetic" (i.e., naturally occurs in the source plant material.)  One of them elaborated as follows (in part) -

Barley enzymes are natural materials in themselves.  The specific carriers and stabilizers used to keep them mold-free and stable need to be reviewed separately.  A preparation of a non-synthetic plant enzyme preserved with a synthetic preservative would be "synthetic."

I once or twice experimented with home made "diastatic malt", with results that were not very encouraging.

When I lived in the US, I mail ordered flour from Central Milling.  It isn't a very cost efficient way to get flour, but at the time a 50lb bag came out to a competitive price even with the cost of postage, and they have an interesting range of organic wheat flours.

I just got off the phone with King Arthur as well.  I baked 4 beautiful loaves of bread this week and used up the rest of my Organic KA flour.  I have two rising that are taking a longer time and the dough feels different to me - spongier and less stretchy.  Out of curiosity (and fear) I looked at the bag of flour to make sure it was the "usual", and to see if there were any ingredient changes, since I have wicked sensitivities to additives (and allergies to some, like sulfites).  Lo and behold, the label ingredients has the  "may contain enzymes or...malted barley extract" wording.  

The KA representative tells me they ARE SWITCHING OVER to the fungal alpha-amylase enzymes.  I explained that lots of people who use Organic flour are doing so because we have existing medical conditions and sensitivities and we don't want to be experimental when it comes to our food.  We just need PLAIN ORGANIC FLOUR without additives.  I have walnuts, sunflower seeds, sesame seeds and honey in this bread, and have made the same exact recipe for years.  This flour is obviously different, and now I have to worry that I will break out in hives from eating my own bread.  Unacceptable.

I've got an entire Thanksgiving meal to cook and I use their flour to making bread for breadcrumbs for my dressing, I make rolls, piecrust, cakes, appetizers.   The rep said he would pass along the info, but I suspect it's already a "done deal".  Please call KA if you also have this concern: 800-827-6836.  (it's the weekend so I just got through to the baker's hotline reps)  

What else do you all recommend that we can buy?  There is a Sprouts and a Whole Foods nearby, as well as grocery chains Kroger and Publix.  
Thank you.

Aj Smith wrote:What else do you all recommend that we can buy?  There is a Sprouts and a Whole Foods nearby, as well as grocery chains Kroger and Publix.  

Somewhere I read that it is suggested to buy wheat and grind your own flour.  Oddly, I think I saw this suggestion on the King Arthur website.  Otherwise, it was above in one of the replies. Because those are the only places I could have seen something like that.

Wikipedia:
"Yeasts are eukaryotic, single-celled microorganisms classified as members of the fungus kingdom".

     "An amylase is an enzyme that catalyses the hydrolysis of starch  into sugars. Amylase is present in the saliva of humans and some other mammals, where it begins the chemical process of digestion. Foods that contain large amounts of starch but little sugar, such as rice and potatoes, may acquire a slightly sweet taste as they are chewed because amylase degrades some of their starch into sugar. The pancreas and salivary gland make amylase (alpha amylase) to hydrolyse dietary starch into disaccharides and trisaccharides which are converted by other enzymes to glucose to supply the body with energy."

"Malt is a cereal grain that has been made to germinate by soaking in water and is then halted from germinating further by drying with hot air, a process known as "malting""
"Malting grain develops the enzymes (α-amylase, β-amylase) required for modifying the grains' starches into various types of sugar, including monosaccharide glucose, disaccharide maltose, trisaccharide maltotriose, and higher sugars called maltodextrines. It also develops other enzymes, such as proteases, that break down the proteins in the grain into forms that can be used by yeast. "

It took me less than 5 minutes on an internet connection to find definitions.  We live in an age where we swim in information.

There are 2 parts to this discussion: 1) is a fungal enzyme dangerous? Is it dangerous when it is fermented in a room with washable walls that has the name "lab" by a tall guy named Dave in a white lab coat who washes the stainless steel fermenter after every batch? Is it less dangerous when it is fermented a wooden hut in a barrel that gets added to every week by a sweet little old lady that calls you honey?  It depends on the skill of the person and their attention to detail, not what they wear or the walls of the room.  And as has already been pointed out, one of the fungi widely cultured to produce an array of products has been used for centuries in both wooden huts and tile walled laboratories.
2) Are the results of malting barley and fungal fermentation the same?  Both produce the enzyme amylase.  However, the side products of the biologic organisms can be different, and may be incompletely removed on the way to the final product.  For a person with food sensitivities, the answer may actually be that they are not the same.  Both aunts and my mother had sensitivities: seafood, anything derived from soy, strawberries, oranges, tomatoes. I learned to read labels to screen out a lot of products.  The number of products with soy derivatives is mind-boggling, and yet they never blamed anyone else for their misfortune, they simply made their own mayonnaise and taught me how to make my own.  

If you are a person with food sensitivities or allergies (they are NOT the same), reading labels every time is a smart self-protective strategy, but even then, things that are labeled the same may have important differences when the process used changes.  The product may change at any time, and the only way to actually control that is to buy your own raw ingredients.  Getting angry at the customer service representative making minimum wage will not change the product.  You need to make the effort to find contact information for the higher management, and politely contact them with your story.  Changes are not made out of malice, and they may be unaware of the needs of their customer base.  

You may also want to explore the products from Bob's Red Mill.  It appears that their management has a higher level of understanding about food sensitivities and allergies, and may be able to provide more or better information about all their ingredients.

I came across this on thefreshloaf.com, KA's response to an inquiry:

Thanks for contacting us here at King Arthur Baking Company.

It is true that we're in the process of transitioning from adding a small percentage of malted barley flour to enzymes in some of our wheat flours such as All Purpose and Bread. It is a very small percentage intended to improve the flour's performance, not used as a filler. Our packaging has been updated to indicate that the flour contains either malted barley or enzymes (since we're still transitioning over to enzymes).

We used malted barley previously because it is a source of enzymes, but found that the level and efficacy of those enzymes can vary from batch to batch. The activity of straight enzymes varies less, so using them creates an even more consistent flour. Also, the process of malting barley is very water and energy intensive, and we were looking for alternatives.

The enzyme added is called fungal alpha-amylase. Enzymes have been used in food products for over 40 years to to help create nutrition in flour for feeding yeasts. Adding enzyme results in improved bread volume and crumb texture in baked goods.

Rest assured this change should not impact your baked goods in any way. If you do find our flour is performing differently for any reason, we hope you'll reach out to us and let us know. Ensuring the integrity of our goods is one of King Arthur's topmost commitments, so that you as a baker have peace of mind and know you'll get excellent products and experiences each and every time you bake.

Zanzii Mahonia wrote:That's really disappointing. For those of us that suffer from reactive type bodies (for whatever reason), it seems harder and harder to avoid unnecessary additives. (One of the science articles I read, seemed to think it made no difference either.)

I know, Zanzii; it IS VERY HARD. I just ordered raw goat milk from a local farmer, and the starter culture she gave me for yogurt-making contains autolyzed yeast, a manufactured free glutamate. Some days it feels like you can't win this war. Big Food is very powerful, and they've managed to get their lab creations into almost EVERYTHING.

Anne Miller wrote:Hi, Lisa

When it says "Enzymes or Malted Barley Flour" does the company mean the bread flour could contain either of those?

I went to their website though I could not tell if this is only an issue with bread flour.

Good question. The bread flour definitely contains the enzyme, as a company rep confirmed it with me via email. Some of the other flours do not, but I don't know if they will later add it, as they did with the bread flour, as I'm almost certain it did not previously contain that as an ingredient. I've read cautions on the malted barley flour as well, though. I'm just not sure why we can't stick with flour that's just flour either way.

Rebecca Norman wrote:It seems to me that the issue is not just the specific additive. Even if it's organically produced, when people buy "King Arthur Flour" they think they're getting plain flour. Wheat ground up to a powder, with more or less of the bran and germ retained or removed. That's all.

If their additive is so great, let them market an improved bread flour with it. But please still sell just plain flour.

Couldn't agree more. But Big Food typically sneaks additives in this way all the time.

lauren sellers wrote:Y'all.  Call King Arthur flour. Call their management!  We need a ton of people to call them and tell them to take the enzyme OUT!  It's isn't needed. We don't want it!!!  The only way to create change is to speak up, speak out, and OFTEN!

I had an email exchange with them (they were polite and forthcoming with details on the enzyme) and also tagged them on X with a link to the article (to which they did not respond).

lauren sellers wrote:
Anne Miller, hi.  I just got off the phone with King Arthur Flour.  I explained to the person that took the call that adding a lab-made chemical additive to a flour that is labeled 'ORGANIC' is NOT organic.  It is the opposite of organic.  I told her that no one that purchases their organic flours wants this 'fungal additive' in their organic flour.  We buy organic flour and spend a lot more for it because we want a clean flour without additives!   The person I spoke to, Maria, didn't say anything much, mostly just listened in silence, and repeated what she is told to say, such as that the additive is 'certified organic'.  I explained to her that anything made in a lab is the opposite of organic.  When I asked who makes these decisions she said that King Arthur is employee-owned and that they take a vote on decisions (not sure if those were the exact words, but something to that effect, they all have a voice in the decisions).  

I told her that this is not acceptable and that there is a lot of talk about it online and there will be more talk coming online. People need to be made aware and especially...people need to contact King Arthur and request that they remove this fungal un-healthy additive from their organic flours.  

Regarding your question about whether it is barley flour or the enzyme additive, I believe it is an either/or.  I thought that the additive was only in the organic bread flour but I currently have an organic AP bag in the house that lists 'enzyme or barley malt flour' and an organic bread flour bag that doesn't mention the enzyme, just barley malt flour.  

Hopefully, they will remove the enzyme from their organic flours. Their reputation has been so good for so many decades but this is the sort of thing that will destroy that good reputation amongst the customers that buy organic flour to avoid harmful additives.

Please talk this up on social media and everywhere possible.  People need to be made aware.  

Thank you, Lisa, for your article.

You're welcome, Lauren. And kudos to you for taking action!

Ben Zumeta wrote:I do not tend to by my microbes when they can be cultured from wild sources, but the question I would ask is what exactly is the “processing” used to make fungal alpha amylase, and what are the effects, intended or collateral? To play devil’s advocate, aren’t microbes, like those in EM or brewer’s yeast, often processed (which could just mean carefully cultured and tested for purity) for use in organic and regenerative agriculture? (I wonder what John Kempf would know or say about this). To some extent, how is what they are doing qualitatively different and worse than taking to a commercial scale the homebrewing of microbes and their byproducts, like beer for ethanol, apple cider for vinegar, or compost teas for more microbes and their byproducts? Can nothing made in a brewery, which is very similar to a lab in many ways, be called organic?

I often like wild brews with wild yeast, but will sometimes but a particular wine or beer brewing yeast for a consistent flavor in the end product. How is this different? The lack of transparency seems to be the main problem to me.

I think the problem comes in the sometimes very extensive lab-processing vs. a natural fermentation process. Many of these additives are excitotoxins, or another category called manufactured free glutamates, which can be very detrimental to your health in a silent-killer fashion. I'm not a scientist or health expert, but I can tell you these additives trigger symptoms for me (I've been diagnosed with mast-cell activation syndrome). I have to avoid them, so when they are snuck into foods like this when I expect the food to be unadulterated, it sucks for me. I'm made sick even though I typically exercise great caution to avoid them. I shouldn't have to look at the label on a bag of flour.

Anne Miller wrote:I am not sure that calling their customer service is really that effective.

The person answering the phone may not even be in Vermont.

Look at their website for their products and for their blog.

Is there a place to leave feedback?

Is there a place to report that they might not be using all organic items in the products?

Make a list of all the products that have these "enzymes", be sure to write feedback for all these products.

Make s list of the results that you got when you used these products.

To Anne's point about contacting the company:

- I wrote to them at this address: customercare@kingarthurbaking.com
- They responded within a week and were very polite as well as forthcoming with the name of the enzyme.
- However, they tried to assure me these enzymes are in use in the food industry, but for me this is no assurance. A great many additives are in general use that are detrimental to our health, and a lot of that unfortunately is a result of the failures of our governmental protection agencies.
- I also agree with Lauren that "organic flour" should not be the label if a lab-processed ingredient has been added to it.

Eric Thomas wrote:I'm confused (I'm also an avid baker and sell my wares to the permies.)  I use KAF Organic Bread Flour, and I can see the "Enzyme*" additive on the ingredients.  Researching the Aspergillus oryzae enzyme, I see that it's also the same as kōji mold, used to make a lot of different products including soy sauce and saki.  On the outside, these substances seem eminently natural and well-accepted by most.  

I do not understand where this is a problem and hoping for some enlightenment, as I want to make the best (healthiest) bread possible.  At what point in the 'processing' does this otherwise naturally occurring mold turn into a harmful substance?  

Thanks.

Eric, I'll repost what I said to Ben, who asked the same question above:

I think the problem comes in the sometimes very extensive lab-processing vs. a natural fermentation process. Many of these additives are excitotoxins, or another category called manufactured free glutamates, which can be very detrimental to your health in a silent-killer fashion. I'm not a scientist or health expert, but I can tell you these additives trigger symptoms for me (I've been diagnosed with mast-cell activation syndrome). I have to avoid them, so when they are snuck into foods like this when I expect the food to be unadulterated, it sucks for me. I'm made sick even though I typically exercise great caution to avoid them. I shouldn't have to look at the label on a bag of flour.

Eric, I'll also add in your case that this is why I can no longer buy baked goods even from small craft vendors because they might have used this flour and be unaware that it bothers customers like me. I now only eat bread I make myself.

Timothy Norton wrote:Food sensitivities are no joke.

I used to work in a hospital's kitchen cooking for both patients and visitors, as well as having to deal with some allergies/sensitivities that I could not appreciate.

Do you know how much food is preserved with citric acid? I didn't until someone had a sensitivity and I had to read all my labels. I was dumbfounded!

Mass produced food is going to contain additives for a variety of reasons and some of them are due to regulation plain and simple. This however does not prevent mistakes from happening and contaminated foodstuffs being shipped out and potentially not caught.

My biggest recommendation is to look into local farmer ground flours or get a grain mill yourself. That is the best way to be sure what is in the product that you have. Then you have better control of what you consume.

Absolutely. Bob's Red Mill hasn't let me down yet, and Janie's Mill is also good. I might move to grinding it myself, too, in the future.

Anne Miller wrote:Since this is such an interesting discussion, I asked Mr. Google what is "fungal alpha-amylase" given by Lisa in her post above.

It seems that this is an Enzyme used by brewers to aid the conversion of grain starch into fermentable sugars.

There is also a Wikipedia article on this enzyme

It is the major form of amylase found in humans and other mammals. It is also present in seeds containing starch as a food reserve, and is secreted by many fungi.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%CE%91-Amylase

It's also a manufactured free glutamate: https://www.truthinlabeling.org/names.html

Admittedly, I'm still researching this myself, and because Wikipedia/Google have become at times such poor sources of information, what's out there can be misleading. There's a book called The Perfect Poison that describes the difference between highly processed lab glutamates and those naturally occurring. It's also worth reading Sally Fallon's Nourishing Traditions.

Aj Smith wrote:I just got off the phone with King Arthur as well.  I baked 4 beautiful loaves of bread this week and used up the rest of my Organic KA flour.  I have two rising that are taking a longer time and the dough feels different to me - spongier and less stretchy.  Out of curiosity (and fear) I looked at the bag of flour to make sure it was the "usual", and to see if there were any ingredient changes, since I have wicked sensitivities to additives (and allergies to some, like sulfites).  Lo and behold, the label ingredients has the  "may contain enzymes or...malted barley extract" wording.  

The KA representative tells me they ARE SWITCHING OVER to the fungal alpha-amylase enzymes.  I explained that lots of people who use Organic flour are doing so because we have existing medical conditions and sensitivities and we don't want to be experimental when it comes to our food.  We just need PLAIN ORGANIC FLOUR without additives.  I have walnuts, sunflower seeds, sesame seeds and honey in this bread, and have made the same exact recipe for years.  This flour is obviously different, and now I have to worry that I will break out in hives from eating my own bread.  Unacceptable.

I've got an entire Thanksgiving meal to cook and I use their flour to making bread for breadcrumbs for my dressing, I make rolls, piecrust, cakes, appetizers.   The rep said he would pass along the info, but I suspect it's already a "done deal".  Please call KA if you also have this concern: 800-827-6836.  (it's the weekend so I just got through to the baker's hotline reps)  

What else do you all recommend that we can buy?  There is a Sprouts and a Whole Foods nearby, as well as grocery chains Kroger and Publix.  
Thank you.

I'm really sorry to hear that, and I feel your pain. I've switched to Bob's Red Mill and Janie's Mill. Happy Thanksgiving, and I hope your baking nourishes you and yours.

It may be that KA will have to do some damage control on this one.  It does seem a bit strange to me that they list the wheat and barley components as "100% organic" (assuming here that they are talking about the USA legal definition of organic) and then just say "Enzyme", with no accompanying mention of organic here.  The devil is in the details, ....and amylase or other contributing fermentation enzymes are easily produced now in the laboratory not only from their natural sources (i.e. bread yeast) but from other sources that have been genetically modified to produce them.  (For example, I don't mind sampling certain newer vegan (?) offerings like Brave Robot's ice cream that uses casein produced by yeast fermentation, using a yeast genetically modified to produce bovine casein [milk protein].  But in this case, it's clearly labeled as such.  https://ethicalbargains.org/2021/10/23/brave-robot-ice-cream-ethical-review-perfect-day/ )  Irrespective of whether or not one considers this process to be unsafe, it seems to me that KA is on a slippery slope with putting this into a product labeled as 'organic' when it could probably get away with adding it to their non-organic products without consequence.  

John Weiland wrote:It may be that KA will have to do some damage control on this one.  It does seem a bit strange to me that they list the wheat and barley components as "100% organic" (assuming here that they are talking about the USA legal definition of organic) and then just say "Enzyme", with no accompanying mention of organic here.  The devil is in the details, ....and amylase or other contributing fermentation enzymes are easily produced now in the laboratory not only from their natural sources (i.e. bread yeast) but from other sources that have been genetically modified to produce them.  (For example, I don't mind sampling certain newer vegan (?) offerings like Brave Robot's ice cream that uses casein produced by yeast fermentation, using a yeast genetically modified to produce bovine casein [milk protein].  But in this case, it's clearly labeled as such.  https://ethicalbargains.org/2021/10/23/brave-robot-ice-cream-ethical-review-perfect-day/ )  Irrespective of whether or not one considers this process to be unsafe, it seems to me that KA is on a slippery slope with putting this into a product labeled as 'organic' when it could probably get away with adding it to their non-organic products without consequence.  

Well said.

I guess I would recommend buying whole wheat berries and grinding it yourself. I plan to take it a step further and grow the wheat myself. I have seed for seven different varieties and one variety of rye. They don't cross pollinate so I can grow all of them side by side. I got my seed from "seed up "  out of Phoenix. It is all organic and ancient grains starting with enkorn wheat which is biblical ere to the latest one that is from the 1800s