Can oats be gluten free?
All oats contain a form of gluten- a distant cousin to gluten, which which may or may not be an issue for you. Read on to see if oats can be included in your diet if you are avoiding gluten.
What is Gluten?
Gluten is the major protein found in wheat. It gives wheat its wonderful elastic quality that can be very hard to replicate with gluten free grains.
Gluten is said to be inwheat, rye (for example rye flour), and barley and rather controversially maybe oats.
Gluten is made up of 2 protein parts: the gliadin protein and the glutenin protein.
Rye and Barley contain a 'cousin' to the wheat gliadin and if you are sensitive to wheat gluten then you will also be sensitive to the rye and barley as well. If you have Coeliac Disease, these need to be carefully excluded.
Oats have a cousin to wheat gliadin called AVENIN which may or may niot be an issue when gluten is an issue, even for Coeliac Disease (but talk to your Gastrenterologist if you have Coeliac Dosease and want ot see if you can include non wheat conatminated oats in your diet).
Gluten in Oats
ALL OATS WITHOUT EXCEPTION CONTAIN AVENIN so technically all oats contain a form of gluten.
The AVENIN in oats can be a lot less of an issue than the GLIADIN in wheat, even for many people with Coeliac Dosease. If you have Coeliac Disease, and would like to reintroduce oat into your diet, discuss this with your gastroenterologist. Many people with non coeliac gluten intolerance can also tolerate avenin in oats.
Wheat Contamination of Oats
Most oats are grown, harvested and/or stored in a way that means they can be contaminated with wheat.
Only oats that are carefully planted, harvested and stored in a way that minimises any wheat contact can be thought of as " wheat free" oats.
Some times, in America these are called " gluten free' oats, but that is a misnomer as you have already read about above. They should be labelled " wheat free " oats rather than 'gluten free" oats.
'Wheat free' oats are oats that are not rotated with wheat when grown, monitored so wheat plants are not blown in from other farms, harvested with machines that are not used for wheat, and stored separately to wheat so there is an extremely low or no risk of wheat contamination. If you have Coeliac Disease and have made a plan to test out how you go with oats in your diet, is is important to choose non wheat contaminated oats.
American wheat free or 'gluten free' oats
I prefer to call oats "wheat free" rather than 'gluten free' as being called 'gluten free' is technically wrong- as discussed above.
Foods in America and Europe can be labelled 'gluten free' if they contains less than 20 parts per million, while 'wheat free oats' that come from Australia have to have 'no detected gluten" as per Australian regulations.
This means, that if there is any wheat contamination of oats, Australian 'wheat free' oats will likely have a much lower level that the American brands.
Gloriously Free Oats is an excellent choice, being Australian and non wheat contaminated.
Normal Oats
For persons with non Coeliac gluten intolerance- this minute level of possible wheat/gluten contamination of normal oats may not cause an issue. Use your symptoms to guide you.
For those on the low FODMAP diet (that routinely includes wheat in low FODMAP amounts), unless you have an individual oat issue, choose normal oats oeats not contaminiated with wheat, it does not matter.
Oat Milk
Oat milk is always made from normal oats- there are no 'non wheat contaminated' oat milks currently available in Australia.
Using Oats in your diet
In short, you do not need to use wheat free oats (also called non wheat contaminated oats) unless you have Coeliac Disease and are trialling oats in your diet or if you dont have Coeliac Disease but find you are equisitley sensitive to minute amounts of wheat. If you prefer to use 'wheat free oats'- despite the low risk normal oats provide- then that is ok too!
Reviewed 20/01/25
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