Well one of the wonderful things about the current meat alternatives is they are relatively easy to make at home from a few basic plant ingredients that are really quite easy to say, yeah, thats fine, and the end product tastes good.
Its when you get into the territory of that "natural flavor" ingredient listing that things get really weird in food. Think la croix soda. Freakish, really unnatural flavor, almost salty even, but somehow they have two things listed. Water, Natural Flavor.
People don't seem to bat an eye at that, but having seen firsthand beverage formulation work (not la croix) its a pretty odd thing. Dozens of small glass vials with oil extracts with intense fragrances of orange, lemon, lime, cherry, etc. Even among one of those, there might be dozens of variants, each a different oil from the plant that produces that orange smell.
How carcinogenic are these things? Do they have any poor side effects? Why aren't they listed individually? Have there been studies on each one?
Its like the FDA caters to large companies not wishing to share beverage and food formulations, despite a cancer epidemic.
Its when you get into the territory of that "natural flavor" ingredient listing that things get really weird in food. Think la croix soda. Freakish, really unnatural flavor, almost salty even, but somehow they have two things listed. Water, Natural Flavor.
People don't seem to bat an eye at that, but having seen firsthand beverage formulation work (not la croix) its a pretty odd thing. Dozens of small glass vials with oil extracts with intense fragrances of orange, lemon, lime, cherry, etc. Even among one of those, there might be dozens of variants, each a different oil from the plant that produces that orange smell.
How carcinogenic are these things? Do they have any poor side effects? Why aren't they listed individually? Have there been studies on each one?
Its like the FDA caters to large companies not wishing to share beverage and food formulations, despite a cancer epidemic.