Читать книгу E for Additives - Maurice Hanssen - Страница 31

Additives can hide the true nature of food. You can use polyphosphates (E450) to emulsify fat and to incorporate water, some 128 (Red 2G) to colour the fat so that it looks like meat, enhance the flavour with 621 (monosodium glutamate), so that the food has an addictive and chicken-like flavour. Add some BHA and BHT, E320 and E321, to make sure that the excessive quantities of fat do not go rancid, mix in some lean meat and salt, and surround the mixture with a pastry of white flour and lard, then you have a meat pie which contains very little lean fleshed meat and lots of the sort of saturated fat that our government advises us to eat only in moderation. The additives make sure that our senses do not detect the fat.

What are the most unnecessary or potentially worrying additives? That list only contains some 1 in 5 of those with numbers. These 57 different substances, with rather more chemical names, are:

Sodium nitrate and sodium nitrite, E250 and E251, are in this list because there is evidence that links them with producing carcinogenic nitrosamines. But the use of nitrates and nitrites in the preservation of cured meats is long established and prevents, among other things, the growth of the lethal botulinum.

The potassium salts of nitrates and nitrites, E249 and E252. are not included in the list, although they are also problematical, as it is recognized that chemical means to preserve meat are, at this time, necessary. They have the advantage of not adding to the amount of sodium in the diet.

What is included in any list of avoidable additives is a personal decision and the wise approach is to make your own list.