General Mills details gluten-detection system

Oct. 17, 2017 - by Jeff Gelski

Oat loads arriving at General Mills' facility might have gluten ranging from 200 p.p.m. to 1,000 p.p.m.
SAN DIEGO Oat shipments coming into a General Mills, Inc. facility might
contain less than 0.5% wheat, which may not seem like much until one
considers a gluten-free threshold. Food and Drug Administration regulations
require less than 20 parts per million of product, including oats, contain gluten
to be classified as gluten-free.

If youre at a half per cent (of wheat), thats a significant amount of gluten,
said Paul Wehling, principal scientist for General Mills, on Oct. 9 in San Diego at
Cereals 17, the annual meeting of AACC International.

Oat loads arriving at the companys facility might have gluten ranging from 200
p.p.m. to 1,000 p.p.m.

And our process takes it down to less than 20 (p.p.m.), Mr. Wehling said. So
in our process, we do get 2- to 3-log reduction of the gluten.
 General Mills began offering gluten-free Cheerios in July 2015.
General Mills, Minneapolis, uses ELISA (enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay)
testing and visual inspection to find unwanted gluten-containing grains such as
wheat in oats. The company does not employ lateral flow testing and relies on
hand inspection instead.

We find that doing hand inspection is much more efficient because we can look
at quite a few more seeds, Mr. Wehling said.

Systems involving blending, processing or handling should be validated for

maintaining gluten-free status.

Make sure that you can pick up a positive contaminant grain in your stream if
you spiked it in, he said.
 Companies should have fields inspected regularly.
Laura K. Allred, regulatory and standards manager for the Gluten Intolerance
Group, Auburn, Wash., also spoke in the Oct. 9 presentation. A gluten-free
certification organization run by the group requires gluten-free product be
under 10 p.p.m. of gluten, which is stricter than the F.D.A. requirement.

Ms. Allred said gluten-containing grains wheat and barley may commingle with
oats, which inherently are gluten-free. The three grains may be grown in the
same locations, harvested at the same time and use the same equipment.

Companies should have fields inspected regularly. They should keep records for
traceability and equipment cleaning. Equipment may need to be adjusted every
year because oats are not the same size every year. Optical sorters should be
checked constantly to make certain they are pulling out wheat and barley from
the gluten-free oats, Ms. Allred said.

Ms. Allred recommends companies use a combination of visual testing and

ELISA testing.