Grains are common in many diets, but more people are choosing to skip them nowadays.
Some avoid grains due to allergies or issues with digestion, while others hope to lose weight or boost their health by doing so.
Choosing a grain-free lifestyle is believed to have health perks, like better digestion, less inflammation, and balanced blood sugar. Yet, it’s not for everyone and might have some downsides.
This article examines the pros and cons of avoiding grains in your diet.
What is a grain-free diet?
A grain-free diet eliminates all grains and foods that come from them.
This includes gluten-containing grains such as:
- wheat
- spelt
- barley
- rye
- triticale
This also includes grains that are gluten-free, such as:
- dried corn
- millet
- rice
- sorghum
- oats
Moreover, unlike fresh corn, which is considered a starchy vegetable, dried corn is viewed as a grain. Therefore, foods made from corn flour are also avoided.
Plus, some people may choose to exclude ingredients derived from grains, such as rice syrup or high fructose corn syrup. However, this is not a strict requirement for such a diet.
Summary: A grain-free diet eliminates all grains, including wheat, spelt, barley, rye, dried corn, millet, rice, oats, and foods — and sometimes even ingredients — that are made from them.
How to follow a grain-free diet?
To follow a grain-free diet, you must avoid eating all grains and grain-derived foods. This includes:
- bread
- pasta
- muesli
- oatmeal
- rice cakes
- breakfast cereals
- pastries
- cookies
Most grain-free diets permit small amounts of pseudocereals, such as quinoa, amaranth, and buckwheat. Pseudocereals can be prepared and eaten similarly to grains, but they are not technically considered grains.
A grain-free diet can be naturally low in carbs, but this isn’t a requirement. Those who wish to include more carbs can get them from fruits, legumes, and starchy vegetables, such as potatoes, squash, and fresh corn.
There are no restrictions regarding non-grain-based foods.
Therefore, you may include as much meat, fish, eggs, nuts, seeds, sugar, fats, or dairy as you wish — though proponents of grain-free diets tend to discourage eating overly processed foods.
Summary: Grain-free diets exclude all grains and grain-derived products but allow for small amounts of pseudocereals. They can include as much fruit, vegetables, meat, eggs, dairy, legumes, nuts, seeds, sugar, and fat as you wish.
Health benefits of a grain-free diet
A grain-free diet may offer several health benefits.
A grain-free diet may help treat certain health conditions
Those with certain autoimmune diseases most commonly follow a grain-free diet, and several studies support its use in these cases.
For example, celiac disease is an autoimmune disorder that affects around 1% of the Western population. It causes your body to mistake gluten, a protein in wheat, as a threat, sending your immune system into overdrive.
This can lead to gut inflammation, which can cause severe nutrient deficiencies and other digestive concerns. People with celiac disease must exclude all gluten-containing grains from their diet.
Similarly, some people are allergic to wheat and must avoid all foods containing it. Others may be intolerant to gluten or other compounds in grains despite not having celiac disease or a wheat allergy.
People with such a non-celiac gluten sensitivity commonly report symptoms like stomach pain, bloating, constipation, diarrhea, eczema, headaches, or fatigue when eating grains. They may benefit from excluding them from their diet.
Finally, in a 6-week study on people with inflammatory bowel disease (IBD), following a grain-free diet improved symptoms in 73% of participants.
Suggested read: The gluten-free diet: A beginner's guide with meal plan
A grain-free diet may reduce inflammation
Grains may contribute to inflammation, which is believed to be the root cause of many chronic diseases.
Some test-tube, animal, and human studies suggest a link between daily intake of wheat or processed grains and chronic inflammation.
However, not all studies agree.
The lack of consensus may be explained by the type of grain researched. For instance, while refined grains may increase inflammation, whole grains appear to have minimal effect on inflammation and may even lower it in some cases.
Plus, cutting out grains may cause some people to increase the quantity or variety of fruits and vegetables naturally they eat — both of which may help reduce inflammation.
Still, it’s worth noting that whole grains may offer anti-inflammatory benefits of their own. Unless you have celiac disease, wheat allergy, or non-celiac gluten sensitivity, you likely don’t need to cut out grains to successfully fight inflammation completely.
A grain-free diet may support weight loss
A grain-free diet may promote weight loss because it’s naturally devoid of processed grains found in calorie-rich, nutrient-poor foods like white bread, white pasta, pizza, doughnuts, cookies, and other baked goods.
Moreover, cutting a whole food group out of your diet may reduce your overall daily calorie intake, creating the calorie deficit needed to lose weight.
Yet research shows that as long as you create a calorie deficit, you will lose weight — regardless of whether your diet contains grains. In fact, evidence suggests that eating whole grains may promote weight loss and boost your metabolism.
So, cutting out all grains from your diet is not a requirement for weight loss.
A grain-free diet could lower blood sugar levels
Grains are naturally rich in carbs.
Suggested read: Vegan keto diet guide
That’s why diets rich in grains may cause concerns for people who have difficulty dealing with large amounts of dietary carbs, such as those with diabetes or metabolic syndrome.
Refined grains, such as those found in white bread, white pasta, and many other processed foods, are particularly problematic because they lack fiber.
This leads them to be digested very quickly, generally causing a spike in blood sugar levels shortly after a meal.
That said, fiber-rich whole grains may help stabilize and prevent spikes in blood sugar levels. So, cutting out all grains is not the only way to lower blood sugar levels.
Other potential benefits of a grain-free diet
A grain-free diet may also offer other health benefits:
- May improve mental health. Studies link gluten-containing diets to anxiety, depression, mood disorders, ADHD, autism, and schizophrenia. However, it’s currently impossible to know whether grains cause these disorders.
- May help alleviate pain. Gluten-free diets may help reduce pelvic pain in women with endometriosis, a disorder that causes the tissue lining inside the uterus to grow outside of it.
- May reduce symptoms of fibromyalgia. A gluten-free diet may help reduce the widespread pain experienced by people with fibromyalgia.
Despite promising preliminary results, more studies are needed to confirm these effects.
It’s also worth noting that most of these studies looked only at the effect of gluten-containing grains. There’s no evidence to suggest that excluding all grains from your diet is necessary to attain these benefits.
Summary: A grain-free diet may reduce inflammation, aid weight loss, and improve digestion and blood sugar levels. It may also promote mental health and alleviate pain in people with fibromyalgia or endometriosis, though more research is needed.
Potential downsides of a grain-free diet
A grain-free diet may also come with certain downsides.
A grain-free diet may increase your risk of constipation
A diet devoid of grains, particularly fiber-rich whole grains, may limit your fiber intake.
Unprocessed grains are an excellent source of insoluble fiber. This fiber adds bulk to your stools, helping food move through your gut more efficiently and reducing your risk of constipation.
If you’re following a grain-free diet, try increasing your intake of fiber-rich foods like fruits, vegetables, legumes, nuts, and seeds to lower this risk.
Suggested read: The Japanese diet: Benefits, food list, and meal plan
A grain-free diet may limit nutrient intake
Whole grains are a good source of nutrients, particularly fiber, B vitamins, iron, magnesium, phosphorus, manganese, and selenium.
On the other hand, processed grains, whose bran and germ have been removed, lack most of their fiber, vitamins, minerals, and other beneficial plant compounds.
Studies show that unnecessarily following a grain-free diet may increase your risk of nutrient deficiencies, particularly in B vitamins, iron, and trace minerals.
You may be able to prevent this to a certain degree by increasing your intake of pseudocereals like quinoa, amaranth, and buckwheat, as these tend to contain many of the same nutrients as whole grains.
In addition, increasing your intake of other foods, such as fruits, vegetables, nuts, seeds, legumes, meat, fish, and eggs, can help make up for any nutrients no longer provided by grains.
A grain-free diet may be unnecessarily restrictive
Although research supports excluding certain grains from certain people’s diets, evidence on the benefits of excluding all grains from everyone’s diet is lacking.
Plus, most of the benefits of a grain-free diet can be achieved in ways that don’t require cutting out an entire food group.
Moreover, excluding all grains from your diet can reduce variety and make your diet unnecessarily restrictive. This may make this way of eating less sustainable in the long term.
Moreover, unnecessarily demonizing grains under the disguise of health may promote extreme fixation on healthy eating, which is common in people with orthorexic disordered eating behaviors.
Summary: Grain-free diets may limit nutrient intake, increase your risk of constipation, and be difficult to sustain long-term. Unnecessarily demonizing grains for purported health reasons may also promote orthorexic eating behaviors.
Foods to eat on a grain-free diet
The following food categories can be included in a grain-free diet:
- Fruits. All types of fruit are allowed, whether fresh, dried, or frozen.
- Vegetables. These can be eaten raw, cooked, or incorporated into salads or soups. Starchy vegetables like potatoes, squash, and fresh corn are good, carb-rich grain alternatives.
- Protein-rich animal products. This category includes meat, fish, seafood, eggs, and dairy products like milk, cheese, and yogurt.
- Protein-rich plant foods. Legumes, tofu, tempeh, edamame, natto, soymilk, soy yogurt, and mock meats devoid of grain-based ingredients can be enjoyed on a grain-free diet.
- Pseudocereals. This includes quinoa, buckwheat, and amaranth.
- Nuts and seeds. This includes all types of nuts and seeds and butter and flours made from them.
- Non-grain-based flours and foods made from them. Almonds, flaxseed, chickpea, soy, red lentil, coconut flour, noodles, bread, and other baked goods made from them are permitted.
- Fats. These include olive, butter, coconut, and avocado oil.
You may also choose to include marinades and salad dressings as added fats and sweeteners, such as sugar, maple syrup, or honey. Still, you’re encouraged to focus on whole, minimally processed foods.
Summary: A grain-free diet allows most foods, as long as they lack grains. This includes fruits, vegetables, legumes, meat, fish, seafood, eggs, dairy, pseudocereals, nuts, seeds, and non-grain-based flours.
Foods to avoid on a grain-free diet
Grain-free diets generally exclude the following food categories:
- Most baked goods: grain-based bread, bagels, tortillas, tacos, pizza, etc.
- Most pastries: grain-based doughnuts, cookies, croissants, muffins, etc.
- Most noodles: pasta, rice noodles, ramen noodles, udon noodles, etc.
- Breakfast cereals: muesli, oatmeal, cream of wheat, etc.
- Grain-based flours: all-purpose flour, graham flour, corn flour, and rice flour, as well as all foods made from them
- Many snack foods: popcorn, crackers, muesli bars, rice crackers, etc.
- Grain-based side dishes: rice, orzo, millet, couscous, polenta, etc.
- Grain-based meat replacement: seitan, etc.
- Grain-based milk alternatives: oat milk, rice milk, etc.
You may also want to avoid grain-based alcoholic beverages, such as beer, gin, whiskey, sake, and Scotch, and foods containing grain-derived ingredients like rice syrup or high fructose corn syrup.
Suggested read: Vegetarian diet for weight loss: Food list and meal plan
Summary: A grain-free diet excludes all grain-containing foods. It may also limit the intake of alcoholic beverages derived from grains or foods containing grain-derived ingredients.
Grain-free diet sample menu
Here’s a typical 3-day menu suitable for a grain-free diet.
Day 1
- Breakfast: egg or tofu scramble with plenty of vegetables and homemade hash browns
- Lunch: salad topped with your choice of veggies, cooked amaranth, smoked tofu, or salmon, and a raspberry vinaigrette dressing
- Dinner: coconut-lime curry with shrimp or marinated tempeh on a bed of cauliflower rice
Day 2
- Breakfast: smoothie made with milk (or a plant-based, grain-free alternative), frozen mango, flax seeds, spinach, and an optional scoop of protein powder
- Lunch: hearty pumpkin, carrot, and white-bean soup topped with roasted cashew nuts
- Dinner: oven-baked sweet potato topped with chili, fresh corn, chopped lettuce, guacamole, and salsa
Day 3
- Breakfast: mini breakfast quiches with spinach
- Lunch: bun-less meat or veggie burger, topped with roasted peppers, hummus, avocado, and a side of buckwheat pasta salad
- Dinner: spiralized zucchini noodles topped with a meat or tofu Bolognese sauce, roasted pine nuts, and Parmesan or nutritional yeast
Summary: A well-balanced grain-free diet can include a variety of fruits, vegetables, nuts, seeds, legumes, and some meat, fish, seafood, eggs, and dairy.
Easy grain-free snacks
Here are a few simple yet nutritious grain-free snack ideas to tide you over between meals:
- fresh fruit with yogurt
- trail mix
- chia pudding
- flax crackers with olive tapenade
- smoothies
- grain-free nut and fruit bars
- kale chips
- hummus and veggies
- seaweed snacks
- almond-flour muffins
- apple chips
- nut butter fruit dip
- homemade frozen yogurt popsicles
- coconut, date, and nut balls
Summary: There are many ways to include snacks on a grain-free diet. The combinations above can be eaten between meals.
Summary
While reducing specific grains can be helpful for certain health issues, completely avoiding them isn’t essential for everyone and might even harm your health.
Suggested read: Gluten foods list: List of what to avoid and alternatives
Moreover, the claimed advantages of a grain-free diet can usually be reached without eliminating a whole food category from your meals.
Thus, it’s a good idea to weigh the benefits and downsides of this diet before diving into it.
