Food Additives
Food additives have been used through out history. When you look in history books you will find discussion over the trade of salt, sugar, and spices. Many people are concerned about food additives and their effect on the health of people and even animals. However, many people do not understand the purpose of many food additives
The most common definition of food additive is "A substance or mixture of substances, other than a basic foodstuff, which is present in a food as a result of any aspect of production, processing, storage, or packaging." Food additives fall into two categories.
Intentional additives:
Incidental additives:
Additives help the food supply to be palatable, convenient, safe, with a long shelf life, and pleasing flavor. The shelf life is very important to the food industry. As the world population keeps growing and the number of acres being farmed decreases we must find ways to store food and minimize losses due to spoilage.
Preservatives:
Flavoring Agents:
Sugar, salt, and spices.
Non-nutritive sweeteners: saccharin and aspartame
Coloring Agents:
Natural coloring agents: annatto, carotene, and cochineal.
Annatto is commonly used in dairy products.
Cochineal is added to meat products, spices, and baked goods.
The soft drink industry is one of the primary color user's in today's market.
Stabilizers and Thickeners:
Stabilizers are added to things like chocolate and ice cream to hold particles
together and to prevent them from settling out.
Thickeners are added to icing, cheese spreads, and salad dressings to provide a
desired consistency.
Emulsifiers and Surface Active Agents:
Emulsifiers are added to keep mixtures from separating out, such as oil and
vinegar salad dressing. Emulsifiers play an important role in the baking
industry by helping increase volume, uniformity, fineness of grain and shelf
life.
Surface active agents (surfactants) is used for things that are sticky and acts
as a lubricant for things like peanut butter or caramel.
Nutritional Supplements:
To reduce health risks some nutrients are added to commonly eaten foods. Potassium iodide is added to table salt to virtually eliminate the goiter. Also dairy products are fortified with vitamin D to reduce the chance of rickets a rare disease in the United States.
Acidulants and Alkalies:
Fruit acids are commonly added to provide the desired texture and tartness to
processed cheese, grape and lime beverages, jams, jellies, and candies.
Ammonium bicarbonate, sodium carbonate, and calcium carbonate are alkalies
which are added to foods to prevent the food from being too acidic. Examples:
canned peas and olives.
Firming and Anticaking Agents:
Firming agents improve the texture of processed fruits and vegetables that
would otherwise become soft. Calcium chloride and calcium salts are added to
canned peas, tomatoes, potatoes, and apples as a firming agent.
Anticaking agents are important in the salt industry. Sodium silico aluminate
is added to salt to prevent clumping.
Leavening Agents:
A leavening agent is any chemical or biological substance that can produce bubbles of gas in dough. Prior to leavening agents yeast was used. However, yeast is not a reliable source of gas. These leavening agents are composed of sodium bicarbonate, an acid salt such as calcium monophosphate, and starch. In the presence of water the leavening agent produces carbon dioxide.
Maturing and Bleaching Agents:
Freshly milled flour is yellow in color and makes poor bread. When flour is stored it oxidizes and "matures" to become satisfactory for baking. To speed this process up flour is treated with chemicals (chlorine) in a bleaching process.
Humectants:
Substances such as propylene glycol, sorbitol, glycerine, and mannitol are added to food to keep them moist. Produces humectants are found in are shredded coconut, marshmallows, and certain kinds of candy.
Reference:
Wagner, Al B. "Food Additives - Why?" Texas A&M University System. College Station, TX.