Tapioca in gluten free products/reduces iodine absorption?

[Jo5454]

Hi

I’ve just discovered, in a roundabout way, that tapioca can affect iodine absorption,so not advised for those with thyroid issues. I don’t know scientifically about this, just thought I’d mention on here.

I have a type 1 latex allergy, have been on a gluten free diet to improve thyroid, but noticed more allergic reactions over past year and generally worsening of thyroid related symptoms, tiredness, muscle aches, worse in mornings, colder, etc.Ive been able to eat tapioca in small amounts, but know it’s linked to latex allergies and after doing an overhaul of what I’m eating, have discovered that tapioca seems to be highest in list ingredients for my bread, & in the scotch pancakes, biscuits, cakes & had recently swopped to a flour which has it added. On researching tapioca, seems it’s moved up the at risk list for latex allergy folk now, and discovered this about iodine. I’ve had iodine deficiency in past, so seems a bit ironic to be eating gluten free to help my thyroid, then eating a lot of tapioca into the bargain!

I know they tend to keep changing ingredients to constantly improve, but I do wish New Ingredients could be printed somewhere to warn us! I’m usually very careful, but with poorer health last year, it slipped me by! Back to the drawing board now!😀

[Regenallotment Ambassador]

wow it’s amazing isn’t it.

Thanks for sharing, I didn’t know that about tapioca either, 🤔 interesting that it links to latex,

I have something maize related that makes me feel awful, sweetcorn is fine, cornflour ok but maize starch….. makes me feel dreadful. I had to stop buying store GF products and make my own in batches and freeze) even powdered gloves for sterile work give me itchy hands. Non powdered nitrile are fine.

Something got me this week, it’s been narrowed down to harissa or tuna 🤷🏽‍♀️ interestingly a homemade polenta cake made me worse too and that’s maize based too isn’t it… hmph

good luck with finding it in ‘new’ …. I’m constantly set back by trusted things or people suddenly being a let down…. New manga ‘trust no one’ 🤣🤣🤣

[Jo5454 in reply to Regenallotment]

I wonder what’s been done to maizestarch, or not done! compared to cornflour, that does that to you. You might think cornflour is refined more,so it’s got rid of what aggravates you, but then again sweetcorn is it in its entirety, so you’d think that would affect you. Oh it’s one challenge after another, our lives never get dull, that’s for sure!

Yes, best idea to make your own so u can control what goes in. What do you put in your g/f bread? I tried baking some focaccia couple wks ago, it was a recipe I found, that I’d got everything for. Well, know some g/free recipes are hit & miss, this one def ‘missed’ my stomach & ‘hit’ the lawn with a thud!🤣 even the heavy mob jackdaws eyed it warily before daring to try!

I used to make my own soda bread & freeze, when I was having to avoid yeast but could eat wheat. I’ve only been avoiding gluten as a trial, well that’s turned into years, but I’m not sure if it makes much diff or not really. When you have a few conditions & allergies it’s all a bit tricky to differentiate.

Do u have any probs with other foods that cross react with latex, such as avocado, kiwi, banana, etc?

Just been contacted by 2 more bread companies, who can’t help with the latex side of things, so another 2 bite the dust!

I’m wondering if sourdough bread would be worth trying to bake? Thanks & good luck to you too…

[Regenallotment Ambassador in reply to Jo5454]

I do a variation on Dr Sarah Myhill’s linseed bread, I bought a magic bullet and grind my own linseeds. It’s very dense and brick like but serves as a suitable raft or hunger blocker 🤣 she has a YouTube of how to make it, happy baking 🙏🌱

[Regenallotment Ambassador in reply to Regenallotment]

Oh and some can’t do linseeds (something related to oestrogen) but I’ve ignored that advice, because if I follow all advice I won’t eat anything at all 🤦🏽‍♀️ I’m orthorexic enough as it is.

Nope luckily no latex related concerns for me, just wheat and maize starch. If I make crumble or cakes for others my skin on my hands/wrists itches 🤔

[Jo5454 in reply to Regenallotment]

Thank you for the oestrogen tip too, I eat flaxseeds on my porridge & have taken a lot of the oil in the past, so willing to try the bread

. Had a quick read, but will do more, but seems flax has been studied at for reducing hot flushes,!Yes, quite agree, have to find a happy medium and just vary things as much as possible where we can…you’re very good to make/bake for others with discomfort. You’ve obviously tried all types of flour, like the traditional grains?

[Regenallotment Ambassador in reply to Jo5454]

Yes I have even grown my own spelt 🤣 I’ve done sourdoughs and all sorts. All grains give me reflux, wind, (Rye is parp central) pain in shoulder blades, foggy head for a few days. 🌱

[Jo5454 in reply to Regenallotment]

Thank you, will look that up. Smiling at yr suitable raft, you’ve hit the nail on the head there. I try to be creative, but sometimes your scrambled egg or beans just need something to raise them up off yr plate, and yes, fill a hunger gap! Shall look that linseed bread up thankyou very much.

[helvella Administrator in reply to Jo5454]

This link might help. I think cornflour (UK) is just the starch only and is the same as cornstarch (US). This link provides quite a bit of information about starches used as pharmaceutical excipients:

pharmaexcipients.com/wp-con...

In culinary terms, this link is pretty good:

theloopywhisk.com/2022/01/1...

[greygoose]

If you are hypo and on thyroid hormone replacement, iodine absorption is not your problem. As your thyroid is not producing thyroid hormone anymore, you need less iodine, not more. Iodine is just one ingredient of thyroid hormones - therefore, in 100 mcg levo, you get about 65 mcg iodine - it is not a magic elixir to improve thyroid function, as some doctors seem to think.

Nor will gluten-free diets help your thyroid. The reason they are recommended is that Hashi's people are often Coeliac/gluten-intolerant, so not eating gluten gets rid of the symptoms caused by gluten. So, if you don't feel better being gluten-free, try eating it again, and see if you feel worse. If you don't, no point in being gluten-free. (I wouldn't eat tapioca if you paid me! 🤣)

[Buddy195 Administrator in reply to greygoose]

Me too…. Tapioca reminds me of school dinners! However, I wasn’t aware it was in hidden in so many GF products.

[greygoose in reply to Buddy195]

Oh, school dinners! Yuk! lol

Well, I can't say it surprises me that it's hidden in other foods. Nothing is pure anymore unless you cook it yourself from scratch. But apart from being disgusting, I would have thought that tapioca was pretty inocuous. Just goes to show!

[TiggerMe Ambassador in reply to Buddy195]

I tried gluten free and tapioca is the magic ingredient that acts a bit like gluten to make things stick together so I would imagine it is in all the bakery style goods... thankfully gluten free was worse than gluten as long as I avoid barley 😅

[Jo5454 in reply to TiggerMe]

Yep, when I first tried gluten free it didn’t seem to very prominent, now it seems to be one of the main ingredients. Well, good to hear you got to keep gluten and dodge barley!

[Jo5454 in reply to greygoose]

Thanks grey goose, I’m not on any thyroid meds. I’ve had tsh of 6ish, but when I had b12 inj, iron, vit d,iodine, went gluten free etc it came back down to 2.7ish. I always have some antibodies, but never high enough to get into the range, so maybe I should be thinking of adding gluten back in. With being dairy free & the latex issues, I wouldn’t say no to being able to eat wheat again. Some and some would be good, am dreaming of making some scones now!

lol, frogspawn puddings was not a favourite years ago, seems it’s having a resurgance in flour and bubble tea!

[greygoose in reply to Jo5454]

Ah, sorry, didn't know you weren't diagnosed yet, should have checked.

Be careful of taking iodine. It is not something to self-treat with.

[CoeliacMum1]

That’s interesting being coeliac although I do try to make my own stuff so know what I’m eating tapioca is in most mixes re flour.

I also have latex allergy nasty skin problems, in fact I also try to keep away from synthetic forms of latex too with all petrochemicals and derivatives in most beauty products etc.

Thanks for the info 😊

[Jo5454 in reply to CoeliacMum1]

if you’re ok with tapioca then that’s good. There are lots of food that cross react with latex, in high, medium and low risk and different people get away with different things. I mainly cook from scratch, but had welcomed finding a gluten free bread, some crumpets, scotch pancakes and the odd treat cake biscuit wise. Tapioca didn’t feature much in them, but seems to much more now. I was generally feeling more ill last year and started having more reactions, so stopped eating all those just before Cmas to see. So I don’t know if it’s tapioca or another component really, but have found it’s considered a higher risk to cross react with latex allergy folk, so going with that for now. All a bit of a minefield really unless u can target it to a single item. Maybe it was due to my health and I was just more sensitive & they weren’t even linked to latex but another food or intolerance.

I was to.d by the consultant 25 yrs ago that with a type 1 latex allergy I would never eat out again, nor eat anything in a packet due to the seals possibly containing latex in glue, use of gloves during making/manufacturing. So when I find something I’m ok with I stick to it as it can take a while to source that info out and sometimes its disappointing! But it’s also amazing when something ok does come along!

I miss the Latex Allergy Support group online. There was a database and u could share findings, when we’d found latex free items/alternatives. Yes, I’m very wary of chemicals. Latex can be in fire retardants too, so am always trying to work ways around that!

If u ever want to swap ideas, always willing! Take care

[CoeliacMum1 in reply to Jo5454]

I follow a biochemist who used to make up her own flour omitting rice due to arsenic levels in rice, and us who don’t have gluten or avoid gluten will be consuming more rice based things … so pays to mix it up a bit and have more diverse diet obviously suitable to your intolerances allergies etc.

Psyllium husk bloats me and it’s in everything… I don’t eat much bread like shop products because of these gums (often they’re a type of non digestible starch) and emulsifiers and alike they cause havoc with our gut microbiome.

I actually never had digestive problems my coeliac disease was found from neurological issues and realised my skin problems was related and after testing nutritional deficiencies and my hypothyroidism and Pernicious anaemia found at same time give it take a week or so.

I had only had asthma from teen and few allergies and then this has opened a can of worms with autoimmunity and all manner of hormonal problems possibly age related are not helping.

Hope you find what item/s causing your sensitivity.

[helvella Administrator]

Tapioca is produced from cassava root. And this snippet might be at least a little interesting to some:

Cassava is classified as either sweet or bitter. Like other roots and tubers, both bitter and sweet varieties of cassava contain antinutritional factors and toxins, with the bitter varieties containing much larger amounts. It must be properly prepared before consumption, as improper preparation of cassava can leave enough residual cyanide to cause acute cyanide intoxication, goiter, ataxia, partial paralysis, or death. The more toxic varieties of cassava have been used in some places as famine food during times of food insecurity. Farmers often prefer the bitter varieties because they deter pests, animals, and thieves.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cassava

[Jo5454 in reply to helvella]

Thanks helvella, I’ve been reading further and discovered that too. Another article commented on how this is carefully removed through manufacture and cooking?, but it’s always concerning when something that isn’t widely used within diets, becomes more prominent & we’re consuming more than we realise. I’ve read warnings about bubble tea and cyanide & limiting consumption too.

[helvella Administrator in reply to Jo5454]

Better take some B12 as well (methylcobalamin or hydroxocobalamin - pointless taking cyanocobalamin!).

[Hidden]

This is not strictly true.

Tapioca is a goitrogen- like broccoli, cauliflower and cabbage. Goitrogens work by blocking iodine uptake, so avoiding them is only necessary if your hypothyroidism is caused by iodine deficiency. This is practically unheard of in developed countries where 90% + of hypothyroid cases are caused by Autoimmune "hashimotos".

Even if your hypothyroidism were caused by iodine deficiency you would had to eat an awful lot of tapioca, or for that matter any other goitrogenic plant in order for it to have negative ramifications.

Many people feel no better on a gluten free diet if they swap out their old diet for gluten free shop bought junk - like cakes, biscuits, bread etc which are full of inflammatory seed oils, refined sugar and things like guar, gellan and xanthan gums that seriously disrupt the gut microbiome. No autoimmune condition is possible without a degree of intestinal permeability, so gut health is absolutely crucial. Besides, about 20% of T4 to T3 conversion happens in the gut and is contingent upon certain good bacteria.

My advice is cut out all the junk and eat a real, whole food diet with no ultra processed food. If you like bread then make your own. You will be helping your gut, thyroid hormone conversion, vitamin status and immune system by doing this.

I don't touch anything with an ingredients list- if it needs a list to tell me what's in in then it can't be good for me. A head of broccoli or piece of steak doesn't have an ingredients list on it!