The Gross Truth About Natural Flavors

Natural Flavors…

The name sounds innocent enough, but these mild-sounding words are used by the food industry as an umbrella term for some pretty horrible stuff, including certain ingredients that come from extreme animal abuse.

The exact definition of natural flavors from the Code of Federal Regulations is as follows:

“The term natural flavor or natural flavoring means the essential oil, oleoresin, essence or extractive, protein hydrolysate, distillate, or any product of roasting, heating or enzymolysis, which contains the flavoring constituents derived from a spice, fruit or fruit juice, vegetable or vegetable juice, edible yeast, herb, bark, bud, root, leaf or similar plant material, meat, seafood, poultry, eggs, dairy products, or fermentation products thereof, whose significant function in food is flavoring rather than nutritional.”

When the phrase ‘natural flavors’ appears on a package, the best move is to call the company and find out what the flavors are actually made from. Of course, I say this assuming that we’re all the kind of people who would be horrified to find out that we might have come close to ingesting fluid from the sex glands of beavers.

Think that sounds absurd? Then you must not have heard of castoreum, which is “used extensively in perfumery and has been added to food as a flavor ingredient for at least 80 years.”

…

Image: Rasmus Thomsen / FreeDigitalPhotos.net

1 of 2

Disclaimer: The views expressed above are solely those of the author and may not reflect those of
Care2, Inc., its employees or advertisers.

Joe R.

3:39PM PDT on Jul 25, 2012

Thanks.

July 25
send a green star

Duane B.

3:02PM PDT on Apr 11, 2012

Thank you for sharing.

April 11
send a green star

Past Member .

11:25PM PDT on Apr 8, 2012

Yechh. I admit, I do sometimes buy things with "and other natural flavors" on the label, but I always have wondered... 'natural' is a bit vague for a reason.