If you are
youngster I guess
you can digest/
enjoy instant
noodles like Maggi
or Top Ramen and
survive. Don’t
give it to your kids
though. It’s a
‘treat’ not
meant for growing
children. These
noodles are made from maida( white refined wheat flour)
unless it is stated specifically that whole wheat flour has
been used. Maida is wheat flour stripped of all nutrients.
In fact, if any ingredient in any product, whether noodles
or biscuits is described as ‘wheat flour’, read this as
maida, and not whole wheat flour.
This applies to the so-called atta noodles as well.
Though these noodles(some pasta’s too) do have some
atta(whole wheat flour), this ‘atta’ is not the genuine
atta that we use to make rotis with at home. What the
manufacturers do is mix atta and maida, or add a small
amount of wheat fibre to maida and lo behold, Indian laws
allow them to call this an atta or whole wheat product!
Unfortunately in India we do not have specifications as
to how much atta need be present for the product to
qualify as a whole wheat product.
And anyway, we all know that these atta noodles don’t
taste like atta at all. The companies who sell this stuff
do not realise that if consumers can make out the
difference between a whole-wheat roti and a maida roti,
they will be able to make out the difference between
maida noodles and whole-wheat noodles as well. A little
bit of brown colour fools no one. There was a health
programme on television recently which said that many
companies make a fool of consumers by telling them that
the product is made from whole- wheat. Actually what
the companies do is mix maida and atta, and the atta is
a much smaller quantity. Don’t we do that for parties
when we want to make soft light puris?
But companies don’t have the right to do it. Specially
when they claim that they are selling an atta product.
The bread companies do this all the time. The so-called
whole-wheat bread is mostly made from maida with a bit
of atta thrown in. The so-called ‘brown’ breads
usually have the colour caramel added to it to make it
appear as if it is made from whole-wheat. Real whole-
wheat breads are extremely difficult to bake and taste
coarse and grainy. It’s easy to tell the difference.
