Unexpected Ingredients In Our Foods
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Food is our way of expressing our love for life; our way of meeting and greeting our friends; way of discussing things out; way of expressing our creative side – so many ways the food allows individuals to create life around themselves!
Only these days, if food is not organic, it would be nice to know where it comes from and how it was “treated” while on the way to the supermarket.
Scroll down to see some of the most frequently used practices… with different foods.
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Eating Organic of from your own garden these days?
If not, what are your some ways to ensure the food you buy is “clean” to eat?
Good Morning! I’ve been busy at work. Hope to check in here and there to learn about unexpected ingredients. Sounds like a very interesting topic. I do have a garden that we use but only in the summer. I try to freeze some and I don’t know how to can food yet.
Good morning, I did get a garden out this year:( I do like buy local from the farmers market
Good morning! I don’t have a garden this year but I am hoping to carve a space out for one next year. I try to purchae my meat, fruits, and vegetables from the local farmer’s market. Not only do they look better but it has to be better for me.
Good morning all! I didn’t have time and energy to get a garden in this year, so it’s the farmer’s market, a food co-op I joined with local organic foods, and directly from farmers in the area as much as possible.
ah…. my morning is running so late! insomnia last night… crazy, need to catch up so saying hi bye… been missing a lot here lately 🙁
good morning oh yes the garden for us we get most of our stuff right here on the farm
Good morning all. We get our produce from the farmers market here.
good Morning no sleep last night so i guess its still yesterday morning and hello today lol! ugh bad night but loved all the ufo today Thanks you so much #AMCoffee Great topic today right before i am going to go grocery shopping great tips thanks
Good morning, I try to buy organic locally grown foods.
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SALTWATER INJECTIONS
No, we do not expect the freshly bought meats to be more in sodium content than those sold at a fastfood restaurant! Unfortunately, reconsider it again.
Usually a whole bird or meat pieces of poultry are loaded with salt water.
Why? –> To make the pieces look plump and attractive to the consumer.
Without the salt water, the meats look flat, thus less appealing.
If you are looking for less sodium in your life or even watching the diet for less salt, you may very well consider the Organic options and even local market options.
But if you buy a regular bird —> rinse if thoroughly to get as much salt out as possible. And use seasoning that is low sodium as well. That may help to eliminate that extra salt it was injected with. At least, to get rid of some of it.
Yuck, that’s not cool. To think of all the things people do to food to make it look appealing! I remember learning that in cereal commercials, they use glue for the milk to make it look better. That way the food doesn’t get soggy and looks creamier. Good to know I need to rinse off the chicken better.
Yes Yuck, I have heard this about poultry but did not know it was done tk other meats as well
Salt water, dyes, I’ve even seen documentaries where they used bleach on meat to keep it from going bad. It seems criminal to me, what food suppliers can get away with doing to our foods.
The bleach definitely scares me more than the salt water but both should not be allowed. It is amazing what the FDA allows to be in our food.
yes I agree but see when we eat chicken on the farm it looks nothing like what you see in the store because it has none of the bad stuff we also eat a lot of venison and it is so much better for you and I know from rasing our own meat when you taste it you will know it the flavor is out of this world I don’t eat salt I cant stand it mean I don’t cook with it my hubby is a salt freak I cant get him to stop
We eat a lot of game as well, Karen. I think it’s the healthiest way to fill our freezer.
yes it sure is Raye
This I didn’t know about. Interesting and thanks for sharing this.
ok so this is truly new something i was unaware of i suppose i should talk to the butchers at the stores and see if this is done in their meat! very interesting and i am going to pass this on to my mom
Gross, I try buy chicken without all that stuff.
CARBON MONOXIDE
IN 2002 the US Food and Drug Administration decided that Carbon Monoxide – same stuff that comes from the tailpipe – is safe for … preserving food.
WOW, that’s kinda counterintuitive!
Carbon Monoxide is used in pre-packaged meats to maintain the “fresh” look.
The carbon monoxide molecules bind with the myoglobin in meat, and that is why meats remain red as if it’s fresh.
The problem is not even in carbon monoxide per se. But because of unchanged color, there’s no way you can tell if the meat goes bad and if it’s a quality meat or fish under the plastic! It may even start to decompose, and you won’t tell it.
But I think it’s such an ugly thing to inject the fresh foods with toxic gases and leave it this way.
That is horrible! I’ve never heard that before. I can’t believe I’m eating Carbon Monoxide. I’d much rather know if the meat is fresh, even if it looks funny! Ugh!
Very disturbing, we have been considering buying half a cow and pig
More and more, I feel the FDA has become a joke. It used to be that we looked for “FDA approved” , now, I don’t feel that’s any safer.
I definitely prefer to buy my meat straight from a farmer. I have raised my own beef and pork before and you can really tell the quality difference.
I never heard of that that is sick wow that’s just scary
om g i just got a ill tummy ache i think I’m gonna start a lettuce and veggie farm and some herbs! its to the point I’m afraid to eat anything sheesh
Wow the stuff they do come up with now days. Organic is the way to go if you want to maintain your health I guess.
Omgosh, I haven’t heard this before. This is why people are sick, getting diseases, why put something in our food that harms us. This is pure craziness.
VIRUSES
These can be used as antibiotics alternatives in food. The bacteriophages, viruses that infect bacteria and kill them in meats mostly. Sounds like a good alternative, but do you really want to risk all those viruses that kill pathogenic bacteria in your food to be actually in your food as well?
And who knows what they can do? Become yet another superbug like MRSA?
Vegetarians, you are safe, but make sure all ingredients are disclosed on your packages!
Yikes, interesting but frightening facts. I do not want to be eating viruses, that I am sure of. I’m starting to reconsider my food choices…
Wow all this makes me want to move to the middle of nowhere and raise my own food
The bad thing is, they don’t always list all the ingredients on labels.
ladies you need to go get you some animals and plant a garden to be sure you are eating safe this makes me glad I try to but as little from the store as possiable I guess that’s why our grandparent and there lived longer they never eat this junk
This makes me wonder about what is worse…antibiotics or viruses? Neither sound appetizing.
what next! i think its time to go veggie blast for good
I am a meat eater too. This is scary and I have though about this before when I first found out but yet I still eat it.
I use to be a vegetarian, then started eating meat when I met my hubby. I’m considering going back to being a vegetarian. This is scary stuff. I don’t understand why anyone would add all these chemicals to food. They know it’s unsafe, I’m sure they don’t eat it.
CARMINE, also known as COCHINEAL
Well, it’s crushed dried beetles boiled in water. It’s used in a range of things from beverages to candy to makeup to paint. It’s up to you if you want to eat a paint ingredient with your candy.
“You might want to be careful about it because in recent years, the FDA has required explicit labeling of carmine and cochineal in food because it’s caused violent allergic reactions in some people.
If you have a reaction to a red-dyed food product, whether yogurt, juice, or candy, you should see if you can get an allergy test specifically for cochineal or carmine. In the meantime, check the label of the product.
If it contains boiled beetles—we mean, carmine or cochineal—check all future labels and avoid the dye until you’re sure about whether or not it caused your reaction. It’s also known as Natural Red 4, E120, C.I. 75470, or Crimson Lake, just to give you more to remember to check out.”
Oh gross! How can they do that? That is so disgusting. I cannot believe half of this stuff is legal! I will be keeping my eyes open for this ingredient!!!
Sounds yummy
I knew this and luckily am not allergic but the idea of bugs being in my food grosses me out but if you look at the amount of bugs and mouse poop that is allowed in our food, it is even more disgusting.
what ever happened to eating food that is good for us its just a way to get ppl to eat this junk and we don’t even know what we are eating
i have yet to crunch while drinking pop lol but wwwww can’t stand the though
I don’t remember hearing about this. It is all about the money and how to make more customers.
I’ve heard about this, McDonald’s and Starbucks came under fire for using this in their drinks and smoothies. We had to cut out all red dyes from our kids diet. Not because they are allergic but because it made them more hyper.
AMMONIA
Ammonia is used as a cleaning component.
– It’s used to control the acidity of cheese, since it’s highly basic.
– It might even turn up for the same purpose in chocolate.
Ammonia naturally occurs in milk, but there just feels like a difference between a natural occurrence and an addition, doesn’t there?
– It’s in many, many products, ranging from soup to soft drinks to canned vegetables to salami to peanut butter.
“You might not find it on the label even if it is present. The government considers it a “processing agent”, and it doesn’t have to be labeled. It still doesn’t need to be labeled even after a study published in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition that said that in eight studied foods, one serving was enough to cause problems for patients with cirrhosis.
The only way around this one is to press for more stringent labeling requirements. In the meantime, if you don’t want to take in ammonia, read labels carefully and hope.”
Wow, what an eye opener these facts are. I don’t want to be eating Ammonia either. This is terrible. What the FDA gets away with is disgusting.
Yum gonna go live in a hole and make my own food lol.
I agree with what you said ……’hope’. It’s sad that a country like the USA allows so much that most other countries have already banned.
@Constance that about sum it up the more you can grow your own food the better
Everything that comes in contact with food should be listed regardless if it is a processing agent or not.
what are we eating this is ridiculous we need to go back to stone age and kill our own and cook it and grow our own goodness no wonder we are all dying bleu
Wow, it just gets worse. Thanks for sharing, I didn’t know about this one.
AMMONIUM SULFATE
“Ammonium sulfate is an inorganic ammonia salt. We know we discussed ammonia up as number eight, but we feel the fertilizer one deserves a little extra attention.
A Food and Chemical Toxicology article discusses the chronic toxicity and carcinogenicity of ammonium sulfate administered to rats as part of their diet, using dietary percentages ranging from 0 percent to 3 percent over two years.
According to the study, use of ammonium sulfate significantly increased the weight of both male and female rat kidneys and livers in the 3 percent group. It did not find a carcinogenic effect at any level of use, fortunately, and to have any negative effects on the rats, ammonium sulfate had to make up at least 6/10 of a percent of their diet, or 256 to 284 milligrams of food per kilogram of body weight per day.
You’d have to eat an awful lot of fertilizer to get that effect. The Food and Drug Administration also categorizes it as “generally recognized as safe,” and the European Union classifies it as an acidity regulator.”
I’m not so sure I’m comfortable with the statement “generally recognized as safe”
I was thinking the same thing Jennifer
“generally”
C4 is generally safe….until you detonate it. Sheesh!
this is some crazy you know what I mean I am shocked
ok can i start fasting with just dirt or grass? this is crazy
Then you would have to worry about pesticides, insecticides, and toxic runoff water….I’m starting to believe that nothing is safe anymore.
This is actually shocking to most people. I wonder if everyone know if they would buy it?
Just love the quote You’d have to eat an awful lot of fertilizer to get that effect.
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I expected to see something here about the wood pulp in fast food hamburgers but the things I did see here are much more disturbing than that!