Can Injera Protect Our Bones? What Teff Can and Can’t Do About Vitamin D

Picture a big round tray of injera with stews spread across the top, everyone tearing off pieces by hand. For many of us in the Eritrean and Ethiopian community, it’s more than dinner. It’s home. So here’s a question I keep coming back to: when East African families move to places like Norway, Sweden, or Minnesota, does that traditional diet help protect their bones, or is there something injera just can’t give us?

Start with vitamin D, which helps your body absorb calcium, the main mineral in bones. Your skin produces most of its vitamin D through exposure to sunlight, but this becomes more difficult at northern latitudes, where the sun’s UVB rays are weaker. Somali women living in Sweden have been found to have a high prevalence of vitamin D deficiency and low bone mineral content. The numbers for our own community are just as striking. In Oslo, researchers measured vitamin D levels in recently arrived immigrants and found that Eritrean men and women both had a median level of 28 nmol/L, while 32% of Eritrean men had levels below 25 nmol/L, a level considered deficient. At a clinic in Minnesota, 60% of immigrants and refugees were vitamin D deficient, compared with 35.1% of US-born patients. Among Ethiopian patients, the figure was as high as 81.3%. If left untreated, severe, prolonged vitamin D deficiency can cause osteomalacia, a condition that softens the bones.

Although injera cannot provide vitamin D, its mineral content makes it worth examining as part of the wider picture of bone health. Teff, the tiny grain used to make injera, can contain higher levels of certain minerals than other grains, including wheat, barley, and rice.

But there’s a catch hiding inside the grain. Teff contains phytate, a compound that binds to minerals in the gut and can reduce their absorption. Its phytate levels are similar to those found in other whole-grain cereals. That’s why fermentation matters. Injera batter ferments for days before it’s cooked, and this process can activate enzymes that break down phytate, potentially making some minerals easier to absorb. The effect varies, though. How much phytate breaks down depends on how long the batter ferments, the microbes involved, and the ingredients in the dough. So the traditional way of making injera may offer nutritional benefits, although its direct effects on bone health remain uncertain.

Still, teff is not a meaningful source of vitamin D, and neither are the legume and vegetable stews commonly served with injera. These plant foods naturally contain little to no vitamin D. Dietary vitamin D comes mainly from certain animal-source foods and fortified products, and injera is not always eaten with foods that provide it. This is where fasting becomes relevant. Ethiopian Orthodox fasting involves abstaining from animal-source foods during designated periods, and one report estimates that these restrictions can apply for more than 200 days a year for those who observe them. A study of mothers in rural Tigray also found that animal-source food consumption was significantly lower during Lent than outside the fasting period. Because foods such as fatty fish and egg yolks contain vitamin D, avoiding them may reduce dietary sources of the vitamin. Plant-based meals can provide other important nutrients, but they generally contribute little vitamin D unless fortified.

The study of fasting mothers measured dietary patterns and body weight, not vitamin D levels. It therefore cannot establish whether fasting caused vitamin D deficiency among the participants. Still, the limited number of natural dietary sources of vitamin D makes the issue worth considering, particularly for people living in regions with limited UVB exposure. Since Orthodox Christian fasting is an important part of the region’s cultural heritage, addressing potential nutritional gaps through fortified foods or supplements, when appropriate, is a more constructive approach than discouraging the practice.

There are also important limitations to what we know. I have not found a study showing that people who eat more injera have better bone health after immigrating to another country. Laboratory studies examine the mineral content of food and how fermentation affects mineral availability; they do not necessarily establish whether people who eat that food have stronger bones. Much of the available research on immigrant vitamin D levels focuses on Somali and Ethiopian populations, often through clinic-based samples that may not represent entire communities. There is also limited information specific to Eritreans. Fermentation methods vary from one kitchen to another, so the findings of a study may not reflect what happens with every family's injera.

So here’s where I land. Injera can contribute minerals to our diets, and fermentation may affect how well some of those minerals are absorbed. But we do not yet know whether eating more injera directly improves bone health, and it cannot replace vitamin D. For people concerned about deficiency, a healthcare professional can help determine whether testing or supplements are appropriate. The food of home can be part of the answer. It just can’t be the whole answer.

Works Cited

Campagna, A. M., Settgast, A. M., & Plotnikoff, G. A. (2013). Effect of country of origin, age, and body mass index on prevalence of vitamin D deficiency in a US immigrant and refugee population. Mayo Clinic Proceedings, 88(1), 31–37. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/23274018/

Demeke, T., Abd El-Gawad, G., Osmancevic, A., Gillstedt, M., & Landin-Wilhelmsen, K. (2015). Lower bone mineral density in Somali women living in Sweden compared with African-Americans. Archives of Osteoporosis. https://www.springermedicine.com/lower-bone-mineral-density-in-somali-women-living-in-sweden-comp/21837012

Demeke, T., Osmancevic, A., Gillstedt, M., Krogstad, A. L., Angesjö, E., Sinclair, H., Abd El-Gawad, G., Krantz, E., Trimpou, P., & Landin-Wilhelmsen, K. (2019). Comorbidity and health-related quality of life in Somali women living in Sweden. Scandinavian Journal of Primary Health Care, 37(2), 174–181. https://doi.org/10.1080/02813432.2019.1608043

Desalegn, B. B., Lambert, C., Riedel, S., Negese, T., Graeve, L., & Biesalski, H. K. (2018). Orthodox fasting and lactating mothers: Longitudinal study on dietary pattern and nutritional status in Ethiopia [Conference abstract]. Tropentag 2018. https://www.tropentag.de/2018/abstracts/doc/453.docx

Eggemoen, Å. R., Knutsen, K. I. V., Dalen, I., & Jenum, A. K. (2013). Vitamin D status in recently arrived immigrants from Africa and Asia: A cross-sectional study from Norway of children, adolescents and adults. BMJ Open, 3(10), e003293. https://doi.org/10.1136/bmjopen-2013-003293

Habtamu, A., Debay, M. Y., Ayene, Y. A., Sebsibe, S., Worku, K. T., Altaye, E. B., & Tadesse, M. S. (2026). Iron content and factors affecting iron bioavailability in Ethiopian injera. Discover Food, 6, Article 356. https://doi.org/10.1007/s44187-026-01107-4

Herter-Aeberli, I., Fischer, M. M., Egli, I. M., Zeder, C., Zimmermann, M. B., & Hurrell, R. F. (2020). Addition of whole wheat flour during injera fermentation degrades phytic acid and triples iron absorption from fortified tef in young women. The Journal of Nutrition, 150(10), 2666–2672. https://doi.org/10.1093/jn/nxaa211