From the article:
If you pick up a can of soup and find that the sodium levels are lower than you expected, or that a food item advertises it has �??less sugar�?? or �??no MSG�?? … then there may be cause for alarm.
A relatively young company, Senomyx, may be responsible for the sodium and sugar levels falling in various grocery store items. They may be putting chemicals into your food right now, without telling you and without you even realizing. Under the law, they don�??t have to.
Senomyx has contracted with Kraft, Nestle, Coca Cola, and Campbell Soup to put a chemical in foods that masks bitter flavors by turning off bitter flavor receptors on your tongue. The companies can then reduce sugar and sodium levels by approximately half without affecting the flavor.
All of the companies declined to identify which foods and beverages the chemical additives have been or will be added to. These chemical compounds are not required to be listed separately on food labels; they are grouped into the general category of “artificial flavors.”
Senomyx was able to obtain FDA approval and a �??generally recognized as safe�?? classification from the Flavor and Extract Manufacturers Association in less than a year and a half, based on a safety study of rats conducted for just 3 months.
Food items that are most likely to contain these new chemicals include soups, juices (fruit and vegetable), ice cream and sauces.
I gotta say, the FDA sure looks bought and sold. A 3 month rat study determines long term exposure in humans. Okaay.
Thank you, I don’t want my family to go around the whole mercola site if I send them the article and then think I’m some kind of guru-worshiping crackpot. lol
And these guys really need to fuck off, who cares about sodium? Now I need to find an alternative to V8 because I don’t want this shit in my chili!
[quote]hockechamp14 wrote:
Thank you, I don’t want my family to go around the whole mercola site if I send them the article and then think I’m some kind of guru-worshiping crackpot. lol
And these guys really need to fuck off, who cares about sodium? Now I need to find an alternative to V8 because I don’t want this shit in my chili![/quote]
I hear ya. Unfortunately, even if you bought stewed, paste, or any other tomato product that is canned, you’ll never know if it’s in there. I think the only safegaurd you could have is never buy anything that says “artificial flavors”, which is where this chemical, according to the article, falls under.
[quote]tweekafaik wrote:
You know what would be amazing? is if these assholes would stop putting so much damn sodium in products to begin with.
There is absolutely no reason for most products to have any where close to the amount they do.
I recently started to notice just how much sodium they cram into stuff because, a family member had open heart surgery and sodium is a big no no.
I just don’t get why the use an additive, then use another additive to mess with the first one. Why not just remove them both and be done with it.
Sodium is naturally occurring but when you look at a lot of labels there is no way that 1200mgs per tablespoon is natural[/quote]
Sodium (and sugar) are added to highly processed foods to make them taste better (Read: to mask the shitty flavor it would have otherwise.) So when the puplic demands lower sodium (for health reasons) the lower sodium food doesn’t taste as good (bitter). This is where the new additive comes in.
My buddy told me about some supplement he took called “instant will power”. You let it dissolve on your tongue supposedly and then for x amount of time after that all carbs taste like shit.
I know it sounds crazy and I’m not defending him, I just don’t know why he’d make up some total load of shit to tell me.
The worst part is that the general, processed-food eating public, will probably rationalize their continuation of eating these products with statements such as:
“Well, they are lowering sodium and sugar, so if they put in a FDA approved “harmless” chemical to make it taste the same, that’s cool, it’s healthier.”
If the stuff turns out to be benign after longterm studies have been performed, then it certainly could be quite useful. Given how long it takes for deleterious effects to be found in additives like this though, I think it would certainly be wise to at least be wary of consumption for the time being.
The worst part of it isn’t the additive itself though, rather its the lack of disclosure. Food labeling has come a long way but it’s still rather pitiful. We have a mentality in this country that if something is sold, it must be allowed to be sold, therefore it must be safe. Since the government implicity or explicitly says it is safe, there’s no need for full disclosure and it would hurt companies to be forced to provide info. In a functional capitalist system, consumers have full access to information and are able to make decisions based on that. In our system that information is classified as “trade secrets” and hidden from consumers, leaving us dependent on various “authorities” to make our decisions. Such is life though.
This shit is why you should cook your own food. Buy a cookbook if you don’t know how. Use Certified Organic, and Kosher components to create your dishes. The crap that they dump in processed food is not designed for your benefit. It’s about $, plain and simple. How many times do I have to keep going here. Damn!
Good thing I rarely eat or drink any of the common shit listed. I’ll make my own soup with fresh ingredients, and I don’t drink any juices except for Orange Juice. Everything I eat is fresh and cooked by me, not some fuck-tard company.