Something happened to wheat in the 1970s during the efforts to generate a high-yield strain that required less fertilizer to make an 18-inch, rather than a 48- to 60-inch, stalk. Multiple other changes occurred, including changes in the structure of gluten, changes in wheat germ agglutinin, changes in alpha amylase (responsible for wheat allergy), to name a few.

But chief among the changes in wheat were changes in the gliadin protein molecule. We know, for instance, that the Glia-alpha 9 sequence, absent from traditional wheat, can be found in virtually all modern wheat. This is likely the explanation underlying the four-fold increase in celiac disease over the past 50 years, since Glia-alpha 9 predictably triggers the immune reaction that leads to the intestinal destruction characteristic of celiac disease.

But modern wheat also stimulates appetite—not a little, but a lot. The introduction of modern high-yield, semi-dwarf wheat was accompanied by an abrupt increase in calorie consumption of 440 calories per day, 365 days per year. This is because modern gliadin in wheat yields, upon digestion, peptides with opioid properties. But this opioid doesn’t cause a “high” like heroine or Oxycontin; it causes appetite stimulation.

Big Food companies, commanding tens of billions (not millions, but billions) of dollars of revenues per year, employ some very smart food scientists. Among their many responsibilities, food scientists are charged with observing the eating behavior of humans who eat their products, often conducting taste tests and trials to observe eating behavior. Surely food scientists noticed that, somewhere around 1985, appetite was enormously triggered by consumption of crackers, breads, pretzels, bagels and the multitude of other test products made of wheat making entry into the marketplace. After all, the business of food scientists is to observe eating behavior.

So why didn’t they sound the alarm? Why didn’t we hear food scientists declare “We think there’s something wrong in some of the new foods we are creating. Specifically, it appears that foods created from the new high-yield strains of wheat are triggering appetite substantially”?

Perhaps they couldn’t, being employed by Big Food companies with a need to maintain proprietary inside information. Or, perhaps they said something like “Shhhhhh! Don’t tell anybody! Let’s just put it in everything!” How else can we explain the fact that, in the 1970s, wheat was found only in primary wheat-based foods like breads, cookies, and cakes, but now wheat is in everything: It’s in canned and instant soups, salad dressings, licorice, granola and candy bars, virtually all fast food—you name it, wheat’s there. (Remember: Big Tobacco did precisely this kind of thing when they used to dope their cigarettes with higher nicotine content to increase addictive potential. As with many things wheat, tobacco showed us how in many ways big corporations can bend products and issues to their own agenda, your health be damned.)

Unfortunately, this is just my speculation, since we are not given access to industry’s internal documents. In other words, I believe it is likely that, not only did food scientists in Big Food know about the appetite-stimulating effects of modern wheat, but they used this knowledge to increase revenues. Is it any wonder we have the world’s worst crisis of overweight and obesity in the history of humans on this planet? But you have the solution: Include none of the products containing modern high-yield semi-dwarf wheat in your life while NOT cutting calories, NOT cutting fat, NOT pushing the plate away, NOT trying to exercise off the pounds, etc., yet you maintain magnificent control over appetite without even trying and can watch the pounds melt away.

Here is how I imagine the entire scenario occurred: