Environmental Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
From Farms to Factories to Families
Nearly everything humans eat has been commercially processed. The
Food and Drug Administration lists approximately 2,800 international
food additives and about 3,000 chemicals that are added to our food
supply. Each of us consumes between 10,000 and 15,000 added artifi cial
chemicals in a day of eating.
55
The average American eats his or her body
weight in food additives each year.
56
Processors have several objectives during their operations. First among
these is the prevention of microbial illness—the elimination of bacteria
that may already be present and preventing the growth of new organ-
isms. However, only 1 percent of the additives used in food processing
is for inhibiting the growth of harmful microorganisms.
57
The other 99
percent are added to entice consumers to eat more or increase profi t-
ability for processors and food purveyors, or both. They include acidity
regulators to stabilize taste, antioxidants to retard or prevent rancid
fl avors from developing in fats and oils exposed to oxygen, fl avor
enhancers to encourage overeating, thickeners to make spaghetti sauce
and ketchup more enticing, carbon monoxide to maintain a red color
in meat packages for weeks, and numerous things to enhance eye appeal.
And water is injected into meat and fi sh to increase profi ts for producers
and sellers.
Grains from the farm are refi ned, which means removing the nutri-
tious bran coating from the kernel, which turns brown seed to white, so
that most of the fl our and rice are white instead of brown. Most consum-
ers prefer their processed grains to be white, perhaps because people
associate white with cleanliness. Following stripping of most of the
nutrients from the original grain, the product may be fortifi ed, meaning
that some of the nutrients that were lost during earlier processing have
been artifi cially replaced. The fortifi cation is not going to make the grain
nutritionally whole again. If it did, the bran coating would not have been
removed in the fi rst place.
Before a food is canned or frozen, it is usually blanched by heating it
quickly with steam or water. This process destroys water-soluble vita-
mins, as does subsequent cooking in water. The loss of nutrients during
cooking in water depends on the temperature, duration of cooking, and
the nutrient. Vitamin C and those in the B group are less stable than A,
D, E, and K during food processing and storage. The least stable vitamins
are folate, thiamin, and vitamin C. Most stable are niacin (vitamin B
3
),
vitamins D and K, biotin (vitamin B
7
), and pantothenic acid (vitamin B
5
).
