From what I understand, most "ancient" grains had far less gluten; it's the modern variants that have caused the widespread gluten issues we see today.

That's obviously an oversimplification.

I don't know if the new varieties caused the gluten intolerance problems, but, no, the ancient varieties have less "quality" gluten. It means that the ratio between glutenin and gliadin is skewed in a way that the gluten can't trap the gas to give it big volume.

[1]https://www.mdpi.com/2073-4395/10/11/1763

[2]https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC6769531/

I use every week these ancient grains because they give a different flavor to the bread (and not only in bread). I also, sometimes, replace 20-30% of wheat with oat, buckwheat, quinoa, barley flours etc.

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What gluten issues do you have in mind here?

Vague digestion issues, maybe that has an effect.

For celiac there's not much evidence that the difference would change whether someone develops it, and once they do develop it even minuscule amounts are very bad for them.

American Red wheat is, as far as I know, the "hardest" wheat on the planet - breadmakers use it to "fortify" flours from Europe that do not have enough gluten (... forming amino acids).

Whilst having a high amount of gluten forming amino acids might sound good in prinicple, in fact breads do not rise as well when too much is present (the gluten is too strong, fighting the expansion of the dough from the leavening agent).

Cakes require flours to have less gluten forming amino acids again.

I'm not sure about pastry though, a bottom pastry for a pie I would guess needs to be quite strong, but I have no idea if there is an upper limit.

The point here is, flours can be as strong as they like, but too much is actually bad for breadmakers - meaning - gluten levels in the diet aren't changing that much.

Edit: I forgot to mention, some parts of China have a pure gluten dish - where they hydrate the gluten forming amino acids, then "wash" the starch out, leaving only the gluten, which they then cook and eat - so 100% Gluten

Seitan is a pretty common food among plant-based eaters.