Image by Vicki Hamilton from Pixabay
Do you really know what is in your meat? The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has a list of nearly 4,000 allowable food additives in meat in the United States food supply. From acacia gum to zingerone, these additives are used for everything from anticaking agents to thickeners to flavor enhancers, to sweeteners. There are 3,971 items on this list.
What exactly is a food additive, why are they in our food, and who regulates them?
Let’s explore!
According to the FDA, a food additive is “any substance that – directly or indirectly – becomes a component or otherwise affects the characteristics of any food.
This includes substances involved in the production, processing, packaging, treatment, transportation, or storage of a food item.
Most of these additives are used to either maintain freshness, food safety, or appearance. Whether to increase shelf life, reduce oxidation to keep meat “looking” fresher and stay pink, or enhance the taste, we use significantly more food additives in meat and other foods than we have done in the past.
While the prevalence of food additives in meat has increased over time, our ancestors have added various components to help preserve or enhance meat for millennia.
Cavemen, for example, discovered smoking meats. It is hypothesized that the early man likely soaked foods in seawater for preservation and taste.
Then the spice trade was a game changer!
Spices traded between Asia, Europe, and the Middle East were sought after due to public demand of flavors those spices added to foods.
Salt and spices were even used as a form of currency. In fact, wealthy Romans were often kidnapped for ransom. Did they want gold? Nope. It was salt and spices they were after.
Sugar also became a big part of food preservation. While sugar is also a food, it’s use in preserving fruits slots it square into the food additive category.
Of the 3,971 allowable food additives in meat, the majority of them include those used as a “flavoring agent.” Most of the time these food additives are things like spices, spice extracts, and flavorings like onion or garlic powder or juice. These could be listed on the nutritional panel as individual ingredients or declared as “natural flavor,” “flavor,” or “flavoring.”
Beyond flavoring agents, there are several other food additives used in meat. For example, there are 189 additives listed as a “nutrient supplement.” Stabilizers and thickeners have 184 additives each in their category.
Other additives are used as processing aids (173), emulsifiers (170), and anticaking agents (99). Antimicrobial additives, antioxidants, leavening agents, sweeteners, firming aids and others round out the list.
In some cases, one listed additive can serve multiple purposes.
Human hair? Silicone breast implant filler? Coal tar? Don’t those ingredients sound enticing? Chances are, you have eaten them before. Especially if you have had fast food.
It might change the way you look at those chickie nuggies.
L-Cysteine is a common food additive found in fast food. From chicken nuggets to burgers, and even fries, this food additive is put in many common fast-food fare.
Why?
It helps amp up flavor.
L-Cysteine is an amino acid that in addition to being a flavor enhancer and nutrient supplement in meat, it is widely used as a dough strengthener and leavening agent in breads.
By its chemical name, it might sound scary. However, if you know where it comes from, it sounds even worse.
L-Cysteine can be found in chicken feathers, duck feathers, and cow horns. However, most of the L-Cysteine used in food additives comes from human hair. More specifically, hair gathered from barbershops and hair salons in China.
By the time it makes its way into the McDonalds, Dunkin’ Donuts, and Burger King products (companies that use L-Cysteine as a food additive), it is no longer recognizable as human hair.
In the grand scheme of things, it isn’t even the worst food additive source we use.
Dimethylpolysiloxane!
Say that three times fast!
This chemical used in silicone and commonly found in Silly Putty and breast implant filler is a common ingredient in chicken nuggets. Which, according to reports, only contains about 50% chicken. The remaining 50% of those golden morsels includes dimethylpolysiloxane and other synthetic ingredients.
But that is a topic for another post.
We know that certain artificial flavors are added to foods to enhance the color and make it more appealing. But do you know where they come from?
A common food dye, Yellow #5 (also known as tartrazine) is derived from coal tar. In addition to the ick factor, this dye came under fire in 2007 for its contribution to childhood hyperactivity.
Certain food additives you may have heard of are unsurprising. Things like citric acid, nitrates, and nitrites are commonplace. But what are they?
Citric acid is a food additive you are likely familiar with. This is because it is used for so many different reasons. In addition to being an antimicrobial agent, antioxidant, and pH control agent to help in food preservation activities, it is also used as a “flavor enhancer.” It is listed as a flavor enhancer, flavoring agent, and flavoring adjuvant. It is also used as an enzyme, a leavening agent, a sequestrant (to improve quality and stability), a solvent, and a surface-active agent.
You may also recognize nitrates and nitrites. These are also common food additives in meat used to enhance flavor, but also act as a preservative. What you may not know, is that it is also used to help maintain the color of foods.
Color additives, often in the form of dyes, pigments, or substances that when added or applied, impart a color on food, drugs, cosmetics, or the human body.
These additives are used in foods to offset color due to the influence of external conditions (such as light, air, or storage conditions) or to correct or enhance naturally occurring colors.
They are responsible for the brown color in colas, the yellow color in margarine, and the green color in mint ice cream.
Yellow #5, Green #3, and Red #40 are commonly used in the foods and beverages we consume.
With all these chemicals, natural and artificial flavors, and color additives used in our food, the safety of their use is a huge concern. Currently, the FDA has the primary legal responsibility for determining if a food additive is safe for use.
New food or color additives must be approved by the FDA and include evidence showing that the substance is safe for use in the specific ways they will be used. Since 1999, even indirect food additives must be approved. This must be done prior to the sale of the product. For meat, poultry, and egg products, the Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS) of the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA)
Once a food additive is deemed safe, the FDA and FSIS share responsibility for monitoring the use of food additives in meat, poultry, and egg products.
In some cases, however, the FSIS poses stricter standards on the products they oversee. For example, while sorbic acid is an FDA approved food additive, it is denied permission for use in meat salad because it can mask spoilage signs.
The evaluation of food additives in meat and other products is never given permanent approval. These approvals are contingent upon existing information. As more information becomes available about a particular food additive, its approval status could be revoked for some or all applications.
If you’d like to know more about food safety topics in the news, like “What’s in Your Meat? Common Food Additives in Meat You Should Know About.” check out the Make Food Safe Blog. We regularly update trending topics, foodborne infections in the news, recalls, and more! Stay tuned for quality information to help keep your family safe, while The Lange Law Firm, PLLC strives to Make Food Safe!
By: Heather Van Tassell (contributing writer, non-lawyer)
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