Hi everybody this is Monica Reinaggo the nutrition diva here with your quick and dirty

tips for eating well and feeling fabulous. Thanks to all of you who participated in my first anniversary celebration and

congratulations to our winners. I'll have more details about that at the end of the show.

Hi Monica, this is Christina. I was wondering about the benefits of soaking grains before you use them. I have heard

some cookbook authors and other people say that go so far as to say that you shouldn't use grains without soaking them first because you don't

get the full benefit and I'm wondering if I need to go through all that trouble.

Okay, thanks.

Bye.

Now I'm guessing that many of you listening are staring at your iPods or your computers with big

cartoon question marks over your heads right about now.

This might be the first you've ever heard about the hazards of eating unsoked grains, but I've actually

gotten questions about this from several listeners.

So let's dive in.

First, a bit of background.

The so-called cereal grains, wheat, corn, barley, rice, and oats all contain a natural compound called phytic acid,

and that's spelled P-H-Y-T-I-C.

Dried beans, nuts, and seeds also contain phytic acid. In the show notes, I've included a

chart that shows you the phytic acid content of some foods. You'll see that as a rule, beans and

nuts are higher in phyic acid than cereal grains.

In all cases though, the phytic acid is concentrated in the hull or the bran.

If you remove the hull, you remove most of the phytic acid too.

White rice, for example, is much lower in phytic acid than brown rice.

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