Bread Crust and Anticarcinogens

Doctors used to say that bread crust and buns crust are unhealthy for they contain lots of carcinogens. Now there is happy news for the lovers of crispy crust; it has already appeared in the mass media. The news comes from Annamalai University (India). The results of a series of analyzes and research carried out there showed that crust is especially rich in a strong pronil-lysine antioxidant.

Pronil-lysine is a substance formed during the process of baking. It has anticarcinogenic properties and can protect the body from intestine tumor development. This substance had already been identified by German researchers from the University of Monaco before. Back in 2002 they found that during the baking process lysine amino acid pairs with flour starch forming the pronil-lysine.

There is eight times more pronil-lysine in bread crust than in the soft part of bread. Experimenting on rats scientists found that the antioxidant checks tumor development in thick intestines by 70 %.

These results were published in the European Journal of Cancer Prevention.