As is true of many foods soy sauce is not good for those who suffer with chronic pancreatitis.
Why not you ask?
Soy sauce is made by fermenting wheat or another grain such as rice. Grain alcohol, ethanol, is made from fermented grains.
There are different types of this sauce and it seems like asian countries have their own formulas.
I didn’t know how soy sauces were made or that the sauces contained alcohol!
I found out from a lady who suffers from CP and couldn’t figure out what was making her sick. She had healed up nicely via diet and supplements and then became ill again. She discovered that soy sauce contains alcohol! However …
Soy Sauce Contains Alcohol
For some reason “alcohol” may NOT be mentioned on the bottle labels. It seems that ALL soy sauce is made with grain, usually wheat. Gluten free soy sauce is made with rice. Rice is a grain. Rice is used to make Saki which is full of alcohol.
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Most of you who have read my blogs know that alcohol is a real “no-no” when you have pancreatitis.
Alcohol and fat are the two big enemies that cause problems for a damaged and or inflamed pancreas.
Unfortunately you may have to eliminate soy sauce from your diet unless you find an “alcohol free” version. You may also want to research other similar asian type sauces before you find yourself becoming ill for no apparent reason.
Bragg Aminos is alcohol free.
Cool. I had to Google Bragg Aminos to find out what is was lol. So for those who are like me and don’t know it’s alcohol free soy sauce or close. Thanks
Not sure why the worry with soy sauce and alcohol. Doesn’t the alcohol contained in the soy sauce “cook off” when used in cooking? Or any alcohol for that matter, such as wine used as flavoring in a sauce?
Hi Kim – Yep “supposedly” alcohol burns off during cooking. Considering that even mild acute pancreatitis can be horribly painful, that often information is wrong (for example “rum cake” is notoriously full of alcohol with people even getting buzzed) and that one severe acute attack with complications can kill you (10 – 30% death rate), feel free to use it. It is probably perfectly safe 🙂
First of all, thank you for all this information, it’s really helpful! And wow, I’m so angry right now. I’ve been struggling with a CP flare-up for quite some time now, for some reason unable to shake it. The same thing keeps happening, i fast for a little while until the pancreas feels better, I then stick to liquid foods for a while, this usually goes well. But then, when i start eating solids, the pain returns. My first solid food of choice is usually a little bit of white rice, which i usually find works very well for me. This time, I’ve happened to have a bottle of soy sauce at home, so I’ve been flavouring my rice with that to make it a little more appetizing, thinking that it should be fine because of the almost non-existent fat content. No wonder things haven’t been going well.. According to Kikkomans webpage, their soysauce contains between 1.5-2 % alcohol.. kikkoman.com.au/faq
I can’t believe it isn’t mandatory to write that out on the food label!
Hi Mattias – yeah I thought labeling laws were fairly strict but it seems a lot of stuff slips through the cracks.
I got popped on EtG test, which is ultra-sensitive to the biproducts your liver produces when it processes alcohol. I know this is off topic to pancreatitis but alcohol is definitely in there.