Among the ancient grains, rye is most popular for bread making and always has been. However, centuries ago, before we developed modern post-harvest processes, rye got a bad reputation from a fungal disease that grows in the ears of the cereal. Eating contaminated food can result in ergotism.due to fungus that grew in the grain.
This fungus, known as ergot, caused people to get intense dermatitis that is known as St. Anthony’s Fire. In serious cases, affected people had fevers, muscle spasms, and hallucinations. Rye, however was not the culprit, but a parasitic infestation in of ryegrass. Today’s rye, however, is treated and safe.
Secale cereale, its scientific name, is a grass and a member of the wheat family and is related to both barley and wheat. But when compared to wheat, rye has more vitamins and minerals and fewer carbs.
Unlike other ancient grains that were nearly lost over the centuries, rye never really disappeared. Many bakeries still use it every day for bread and other baked goods, making it hardly a real ancient grain except for its origin.
It has been in an out of vogue some places, but never in Northern Europe, where it remains in high demand. At Abigail’s Oven we bake a Jewish sourdough rye nearly week, but demand here is nothing like it is in Europe. “In Finland, for example, rye has been consumed for thousands of years, and it was recently selected as the country’s national food.”1
Because in the field, rye tolerates cold climates better than most other grains it is well suited for those northern latitudes. And for centuries it was often the only grain available for bread making there. That’s why, over the years, bakers in northern Europe became exceptional at making it into bread.
For example, they discovered that a lot of steam during baking makes a better loaf. The steam keeps the bread crust soft initially, allowing it to expand better and then carmelize and harden as steam is removed. A fun example of using steam for baking rye is in Iceland where at least one bakery steam-bakes its rye bread in a geothermal spring.
But the world over, bakers have learned that customers want rye for both good nutrition and better bread flavor. They have found using sourdough and a long-ferment in their rye bread makes for a singular flavor.
Fifty years ago, during my first week in Germany, I tasted German rye. I had eaten rye back home, but did not like the flavor from the caraway seeds. Dad did, so we had it around the kitchen sometimes.
But from that first taste in Germany I was sold. It was a flavor I cannot describe well, but Ari Weinzweig, did when he wrote this in The Atlantic:
“Rye has a deep flavor, a flavor of the earth, a flavor full of character, a flat feel on the back of your tongue that gradually fills your whole mouth. And it should be chewy. Both crust and crumb should work your jaws. On a perfect day the crust should crackle. Other days it’s just gonna help keep your jaws in shape.
“If a baguette is the high note of bread, then rye bread is the bass. Steady, delicious, never wavering, it’s rooted in the soil of northern Europe. Its sturdy texture and lightly sour flavor provide the perfect pairing for a thick schmear of cream cheese or sweet butter. Good rye has guts. And it’s really, really good.”2
History of Rye Bread
It is unclear exactly when and where wild rye won the game of creeping into ancient fields of wheat where it was seen as a weed. But that ancient variety had much smaller grains than today’s rye and grew to six feet in height.
The rye of today stems from this Weedy rye (S. cereale ssp segetale) of the past. Scholars have discovered that more than other domesticated crops, rye will jump from “wild to weed to crop and then back to weed again… in as few as 60 generations.”3
It is known to have grown in the Middle-east at least 7,000 years ago in modern-day Turkey.4 Then as grain farming moved northward, rye’s hardiness prevailed over wheat. “It is an extremely undemanding, frost-resistant grain that grows on poor soils, even at 2,000 meters (6500 feet) above sea level… and eventually evolved into the grain we know today as ordinary rye.”5
In the 12th century, when a round of wheat crops failed, Germans chose rye because it tends to do very well in the wet, cool Northern European plains. It remains a favored grain of that region, in spite of the dangers of ergot, a fungus that once was a common disease of rye that swept through communities leaving thousands permanently disabled or dead.
Outbreaks “most frequently surfaced in the summers after cold, wet winters that were followed by long, damp springs. Entire families would find themselves afflicted with either symptoms of burning and eventual gangrene in the hands and feet or with epileptic-like convulsions, headaches and hallucinations.”6
During this same period of history, “the precise use of ergot by midwives for inducing labor and abortion” came into practice. “Ergot’s medical legacy has been carried into the present with ergot-based therapies being explored to treat Parkinson’s disease and dementia symptoms. Balancing the edge between helpful and harmful, ergot is yet another a classic example of the toxicology adage ‘sola dosis facit venenum,’ or ‘the dose makes the poison.'”7
When the cause of the disease was discovered in 1850, researchers found that crop rotation and deep cultivation prevented the germination of the fungus. Alongside these precautions, it was also found that a solution 30% potassium chloride applied to seeds forced ergot to float to the top where it can be skimmed off. Then the seeds can be planted without the worry of the fungal growth.
Rye Bread’s Nutritional Values
Today, worldwide, people are discovering the advantage of rye’s high fiber. Fiber in whole grain, and particularly in rye improve digestion, can help prevent constipation, and reduced risk of certain cancers, including breast and colorectal cancers. And in fact, “Fiber from rye appears more effective than that from wheat in overall improvement of biomarkers of bowel health.”8
Rye flour, while high in fiber, is low in fat. Compared to other breads it is lower on the glycemic index, meaning no spike in blood sugar.9 Nonetheless, like other grain it is mostly carbohydrates, which makes its glycemic load high. “However, compared to wheat, rye contains fewer carbs and more vitamins and minerals.”10
A 100 g (3.5 oz.) serving of whole-grain rye contains:
- 338 calories
- 10 g protein
- 2 g fat
- 76 g carbohydrates
- 15 g dietary fiber— 60% of the DV
- Iron: 23% of RDI
- Manganese: 143% of the DV
- Copper: 41% of the DV
- Phosphorus: 47% of the DV
- Magnesium: 31% of the DV 11
Healthy as rye is, it is not gluten-free. It is high in gliadin, low in glutenin, and has a gluten content lower than wheat flour.
Other Health Benefits
A new study made by the University of Eastern Finland, “shows that both lactic acid bacteria and gut bacteria contribute to the health benefits of rye.”12 In another study at the University of Ss. Cyril and Methodius in Slovakia, they report that it “is an interesting source of natural compounds with potent biological activities. Increased consumption of foods containing rye as a whole grain or as wholegrain flour can lead to the consumption of phytochemicals beneficial to the consumer’s health.”13
And these points from Science Direct
- “Blood glucose flux is slower with rye than with refined wheat bread.
- “Whole-grain rye has lower inflammatory biomarker concentration than refined wheat.
- “Weight loss is greater with whole-grain rye than whole grain or refined wheat.
- “Some rye foods appear to have cholesterol-lowering properties.”
“Regardless of the many health benefits rye foods may have,” they concluded, “these foods will not be of benefit unless they are consumed. Development of many new, innovative, and tasty rye products, associated health claims, good marketing, and efficient communication are crucial in order to increase awareness and consumption of rye foods among consumers.”14
To that end Marcus Bertram, master baker at Berlin’s KaDeWe’s said the taste of 100% rye ”is just too strong for most people”15 with a texture like a brick. “So wheat flour, which has more gluten, is added to lighten and refine the loaf.”16 And I can tell you his recipe worked for me.
Every Friday, while I lived in Berlin, I shopped at KaDeWe for bread and cheese, little did I know that “the store sells 400 to 2,500 loaves of rye a day.”17
“But the Germans have always had an unequaled passion for traditional ryes,” reports R. W. Apple Jr. for the New York Times, “whether tan, brown or almost black. Most have a malty, slightly sour taste. The best are moist when fresh. When you bite into a dense, delectable slice, you have a sense that you are eating something primeval, something undying, something expressive of its origins, like honest wine.”18
Germans, by the way, “make more kinds of bread than anyone else, some 300 varieties, a vast majority containing rye flour, said Heinrich Junemann, the head of the Berlin bakers’ guild. They also eat far more bread than anyone else—185 pounds a year, on average, for every man, woman, and child—and in the bleak, hungry years after World War II, when little other food was available, that amount was 310 pounds a year.”19
Whether it is for taste, or your health, when this bread is crafted into perfection, it can be appreciated by anyone. Here on the site we have several recipes Marbled Rye and German Rye Bread (Graubrot) that you might try.
Once you bake with rye, tell us about your experience in the comment sections below.
1 “Rye is healthy, thanks to an interplay of microbes” University of Eastern Finland, August 5, 2019
2 Ari Weinzweig, “5 Qualities of Great Rye Bread,” The Atlantic, Oct 2009
3 K. Kris Hirst, “Domestication History of Rye,” ThoughtCo., June 2019
4 “Rye is healthy, thanks to an interplay of microbes” University of Eastern Finland, August 5, 2019
5 Puratos, “A story about rye bread,” Feb 2017
6-7 “From Poisoning to Pharmacy: a Tale of Two Ergots,” American Society for Microbiology, Nov 2018
8 McIntosh, Noakes, Royle, and Foster, Whole-grain rye and wheat foods and markers of bowel health in overweight middle-aged men, The American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, Volume 77, Issue 4, April 2003, Pages 967–974
9 Rosén, et.al., “Endosperm and whole grain rye breads are characterized by low post-prandial insulin response and a beneficial blood glucose profile,” Nutrition Journal, 2009, 8:42
10 Ryan Raman, “12 Healthy Ancient Grains,” Healthline, May 2019
11 USDA, FoodData Central
12 “Rye is healthy, thanks to an interplay of microbes” University of Eastern Finland, August 2019
13 Kulichová, et. al., “Phenolic compounds and biological activities of rye (Secale cereale L.) grains,”Open Chemistry | Volume 17: Issue 1
14 K. Jonsson, et. al., Rye and health – Where do we stand and where do we go? Trends in Food Science & Technology, Volume 79, September 2018, Pages 78-87
15-18 R. W. Apple Jr.,“The Miracle of Rye; In Germany, and among some here, rye bread is a spiritual thing.” NY Times, July 199
Author: Darryl Alder lives with his wife in Riverside Lodge, which is their home along the Provo River in Utah. He is a retired career Scouter and outdoorsman who spent many hours over a campfire using a Dutch oven and loves sharing recipes for the kitchen and the campfire alike. You can read many of his recipes on this site by searching for Sourdough Saturday or Recipes on the top right-hand side of the blog
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