Last night, 23/11/'15, on the BBC at peak viewing, an hour's insight into the future of aspects of food was shown.
Overall presented by Dara O'Briain, one section showed truckers in a classic workers's cafe tucking into a hefty English breakfast but being challenged to take capsules of brown seaweed at the same time. It was postulated by the scientist involved that the effect of the alginate was principally by it interfering with fat absorption. The evidence for this seems indefinite, but it might also act as a bulking agent increasing the rate of flow of food through the gut and thus the absorption of fat and presumably anything else. Alginates are very sticky and thus there presence in the gut would be to bind with or make the other food adhere to it to increase the bolus and its mechanical presence and thus encourage gut propulsion. This, it was hoped, would help the truckers lose weight without changing their diet. Indeed after four weeks the bunch of truckers, about seven or eight of them, lost an average of one and a half kilos.
I contend that better bread, high in fibre, low in gluten and starch would have the same effect. I mean seriously different bread where the fibre content is around 20%. Then the truckers could enjoy their breakfasts with very light brown toast and not need the alginate capsules.
