I now make these ingredients from scratch, they don't take very long, they taste great and more importantly I get a kick out of doing it and I love making healthy choices for my family.
Food companies are clever and they know consumers are a little more savvy these days so putting things like "natural flavour" on the box we as consumers believe this is better for us because it's natural flavour as opposed to chemical flavours [listed as numbers on the packet]. I for one thought "natural flavour" was just that, natural and not chemical however if you read this latest blog post from Tracey & Jo from Additive Free Lifestyle about this subject you will be a little shocked.
What we perceive to be healthy and what is healthy can be two different things. I've copied this from a post from last year. Here is a quote about spinach wraps you buy in the shops.
"You will notice that the reason they are green is from a combination of blue and yellow food colour and they use spinach ‘seasoning’ (no real spinach!)"
This is the ingredient list from the store bought spinach wraps [as per Additive Free Lifestyle blog] - Honestly what is all of this stuff.
Ingredients: Enriched Bleached Wheat Flour (Wheat Flour, Niacin, Reduced Iron, Thiamine Mononitrate, Riboflavin, Folic Acid), Water, Vegetable Shortening (Interesterified Soybean Oil, Hydrogenated Soybean Oil and/or Palm Oil), contains 2% or less of each of the following: Seasoning (Spinach Powder, Onion Powder, Spice, Salt, Garlic Powder, Soybean Oil, Artificial Colors [FD&C Yellow #5 Lake and FD&C Blue #1 Lake], Natural and Artificial Flavor), Salt, Leavening (Sodium Bicarbonate, Sodium Aluminum Sulfate, Corn Starch, Monocalcium Phosphate and/or Sodium Acid Pyrophosphate, Calcium Sulfate), Distilled Monoglycerides, Enzymes, Wheat Starch, Calcium Carbonate, Antioxidants (Tocopherols, Ascorbic Acid), Vital Wheat Gluten, Cellulose Gum, Dough Conditioners (Fumaric Acid, Sodium Metabisulfite), Preservatives (Calcium Propionate, Sorbic Acid and/or Citric Acid).
Here is a recipe to make your own spinach wraps using 6 ingredients real spinach, flour, baking powder, salt, butter, water and olive oil. These ingredients we all know what they are compared to the list on the packaged wraps above. It's quite frightening and if you were buying wraps generally you would think spinach wraps are healthier than plain wraps so again our perception of healthy is buy the spinach ones when in fact they are probably all the same. It's a bit of false sense of security about buying the healthy option for your family as we think we are doing the right thing.
"You will notice that the reason they are green is from a combination of blue and yellow food colour and they use spinach ‘seasoning’ (no real spinach!)"
This is the ingredient list from the store bought spinach wraps [as per Additive Free Lifestyle blog] - Honestly what is all of this stuff.
Ingredients: Enriched Bleached Wheat Flour (Wheat Flour, Niacin, Reduced Iron, Thiamine Mononitrate, Riboflavin, Folic Acid), Water, Vegetable Shortening (Interesterified Soybean Oil, Hydrogenated Soybean Oil and/or Palm Oil), contains 2% or less of each of the following: Seasoning (Spinach Powder, Onion Powder, Spice, Salt, Garlic Powder, Soybean Oil, Artificial Colors [FD&C Yellow #5 Lake and FD&C Blue #1 Lake], Natural and Artificial Flavor), Salt, Leavening (Sodium Bicarbonate, Sodium Aluminum Sulfate, Corn Starch, Monocalcium Phosphate and/or Sodium Acid Pyrophosphate, Calcium Sulfate), Distilled Monoglycerides, Enzymes, Wheat Starch, Calcium Carbonate, Antioxidants (Tocopherols, Ascorbic Acid), Vital Wheat Gluten, Cellulose Gum, Dough Conditioners (Fumaric Acid, Sodium Metabisulfite), Preservatives (Calcium Propionate, Sorbic Acid and/or Citric Acid).
Here is a recipe to make your own spinach wraps using 6 ingredients real spinach, flour, baking powder, salt, butter, water and olive oil. These ingredients we all know what they are compared to the list on the packaged wraps above. It's quite frightening and if you were buying wraps generally you would think spinach wraps are healthier than plain wraps so again our perception of healthy is buy the spinach ones when in fact they are probably all the same. It's a bit of false sense of security about buying the healthy option for your family as we think we are doing the right thing.
In our pantry we have a lot of ingredients and not packets and I've made a lot of progress over the last year.
Tracey and Jo run Additive Free Workshops from time to time and they bought a packet of Anzac Biscuits from the bakery of a well know Australian Supermarket to take along to the workshops to show the ingredient label and explain all the items on it. The other day she posted a pic of the biscuits on IG and they looked like she had just bought them that day. She asked people how old did we think the biscuits were and she said she had bought them for their first workshop 3 years ago and they were still in the packet going strong, not mouldy, not off. That is scary that a packet of bakery biscuits still hold their structure in the packet and haven't gone off in 3 years. On occasions when I have run out of time I've actually bought these biscuits myself for afternoon tea for the kids after school. I was shocked and will not be ever buying these if I run out of time. I would have been shocked if she said 6 months however 3 years that is crazy...just like the burger at the fast food chain that doesn't go off for 20 years.
We have full control over what we put in our bodies and having knowledge about how to go Additive & Preservative free is easier than you think. Next time you see even an organic product with "natural flavouring" think again.
This is another great resource that I got onto years ago "100 Days of Real Food" and Lisa's cookbooks are both great. This is their story and oh so jealous of their mountain "tiny house" too. This is their holiday home and what a location how beautiful. I have two of her books here and here. In her book she tells you how her family went additive and preservative free and committed to trying it for 100 days. She and her husband were into healthy eating and exercise however when they started the 100 days of real food they realized how little they did know because of food packaging and what the marketers of food try to tell you. I can highly recommend her books and also lots of articles on her blog as well. I love the internet and the fact that we can get access to so much information from right here in our homes. Have a good week and let me know if you have any great blogs or books you have come across that made you aware of these things.
Petroleum and coal tar? WTH! How are they allowed to put that in food, the food we give to our children. Thank you for this post, Kathy, and the link to Tracy and Jo's blog post too. I already cook mostly from scratch, but this blog post has made me more determined to make as much food for myself as I possibly can.
ReplyDeleteI know Jan, it's hard to believe it's legal but then again people can smoke knowing it can kill you so I guess we have to take matters into our own hands.
DeleteI remember when 100 Days Of Real Food blog first started. I thought it was brilliant. It was information I'd just began researching and it was very overwhelming initially. Once you start realizing your pantry and refrigerator are full of questionable ingredients it's difficult to know where to start. Lisa's blog helped me quite a bit. I've been loving the Additive Free Lifestyle blog as well since you've been sharing bits about it here. Have a great week!
ReplyDeleteI agree Lisa's book is so great, I'll have to have a read of it in the next week again.
DeleteIt is truly scary to read a list of ingredients and not know what more than half of them are! Have you read Michael Pollan's book "In Defense of Food"? There are plenty of oft-used quotes from it but one that relates to what you're writing about here is "Don't eat anything incapable of rotting."
ReplyDeleteI must learn to make crumpets. I've not tried that yet. Meg:)
I've read his book a number of years ago eye opening. Here's the link to the crumpet recipe. I made them and then froze them so we got them out when we needed them. It makes a big recipe. If you don't have a pie maker you can use a silicon egg ring as it will be easier to get them out instead of the metal ones.
Deletehttps://oursimpleandmeaningfullife.blogspot.com/search?q=crumpets
DeleteThanks for those links, Kathy. I will check them out later. It is scary to read what is in some food items on sale in the supermarkets. I am sure most people would be very surprised if they read the labels.
ReplyDeleteYes however the food companies get smarter all the time and as you know MSG is not good however there are many forms of MSG [lots actually] so again we think if MSG is not listed it's not in it however they use other labels for it.
DeleteWOW! Just WOW!! I wish I could stick to a thing!! Your posts have made me aware of the additive free blog for some time, and I do this thing where, I read about it, get fired up, go all addictive free, then get lazy and it all goes by the wayside! 😩 But once again I’m fired up. I’m about to go and check out the links, and see how it goes. Thanks for the link to the crumpet recipe, I made crumpets last week and they were a complete disaster! LOL!! I wish I could send you a photo I know you’d get a laugh out of it, they looked more like badly shaped English muffins!
ReplyDeleteSo glad the post came at a good time Cheryl....I must admit those store bought 3 year old bakery biscuits even shocked me. Also if you haven't watched "That Sugar Film" do that too because of all the hidden sugars in food.
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