Is spelt gluten-free? No, and neither is einkorn

It is the trick question of the bakery aisle. “Spelt” bread is sold as rustic, ancient, digestible, almost as an alternative to wheat. And many people, customers, shop staff, sometimes bakers, conclude that it is gluten-free. It is not. Spelt is a wheat, einkorn is a wheat, and both contain gluten.

Spelt is a wheat

Spelt, Triticum spelta, is a subspecies of wheat, a direct cousin of common wheat. It differs by its hulled grain, which has to be dehusked, and by a historically more rustic cultivation. Its gluten content is comparable to that of common wheat, sometimes higher; that gluten is a little different, more fragile, less elastic, but it is gluten in the strict sense, with the same fractions that trigger the celiac reaction.

Einkorn, Triticum monococcum, is the oldest wheat cultivated by humans, ten thousand years ago. Its genome is simpler than modern wheat’s, its gluten has a different composition, and research explores whether it is less toxic. But no patient association, no gastroenterologist allows it in a gluten-free diet: studies show that it activates the immune response of people with celiac disease.

The law leaves no doubt either: European Regulation 1169/2011 explicitly names spelt and kamut among the “cereals containing gluten” to be declared as allergens, alongside wheat, rye, barley and oats.

Where the confusion comes from

Three sources, which reinforce one another.

“Easier to digest.” True for some people who do not have celiac disease and digest industrial bread poorly: spelt’s more fragile gluten, and often a slower sourdough bake, give a better-tolerated bread. That real argument slid towards “gluten-free” by dint of repetition.

“Ancient”, “unmodified.” The idea that modern wheats were “loaded” with gluten by breeding, and that ancient wheats would be free of it. Ancient wheats have a different gluten, not an absent one.

The aisle. Spelt breads are often placed near gluten-free breads, in the same “alternative” logic. Proximity does the rest.

What it changes in practice

• A “spelt” loaf is a wheat loaf. It will in fact be labelled “spelt (wheat)” or with the allergen in bold. If a label says “spelt” without mentioning wheat, the label is badly done, not the product gluten-free.
• At the bakery, the question “is it gluten-free?” asked about a spelt loaf sometimes gets a sincere and wrong “yes”. The right question is “which flour?”. Our article on how to spot a safe gluten-free bakery says how to go further.
• Spelt pasta, biscuits, crackers fall under the same case: wheat allergen, to be excluded.
• Spelt beer contains gluten, like barley beer.

The same reasoning applies to other “ancient” grains that are wheats: kamut (Khorasan wheat), triticale (a wheat-rye cross), Italian farro (which refers to spelt or emmer). We group them with seitan, couscous and bulgur in the false friends.

What is genuinely gluten-free among the “ancients”

Not to throw the baby out with the bathwater: the ancient grains and pseudo-cereals aisle holds real allies. Buckwheat (which is not a cereal, as we explain), millet, quinoa, amaranth, teff, sorghum, fonio contain no gluten. The reservation, for them, is supply-chain contamination, not the plant.

In short