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Something Light: It’s made from what!?
I don’t know whether to be disgusted or intrigued: For years now I have ingested numerous products containing “natural” red dye, but I never gave a thought to where it came from–until now.
Well, it turns out that one of the best ways to make a “natural” red food coloring is to crush the dried bodies of the female Dactylopius coccus — a cactus-eating insect from the Americas.
The resulting scarlet hue brightens some of our popular juices, candies, yogurts and ice creams. And the same coloring can be used in makeup including lipstick.
Know of any other food products that come from strange origins?
Topic: Watercooler Chatter, WorldMagBlog
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back to top25 Comments to “Something Light: It’s made from what!?”
Kelp is in just about everything from ice cream to lipstick.
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Adios, and it’s surprising how many things contain petroleum.
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I don’t know if this is a strange origin, but Slim Jims are made from “mechanically separated chicken parts.” When I saw that, I had to stop and think about what parts of a chicken might require so much processing that the Slim Jim folks would have to cop to it on the label.
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Have any of you ever thought about what andouille sausage is made of???
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Kim,
Its a rule of thumb to never question how laws or sausages are made. Sheesh now we have both today
I love andouille sausage and I know what’s in there so I try not to think about it.
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Kim, andouille sausage parts?????
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Never ask about anything Cajun. A Cajun friend of mine says the the difference between Louisiana zoos and other zoos is that in Louisiana the zoo signs for each animal includes a recipe.
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Oh, Kbells, you’re on a roll this morning . . .
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Just think of the ramifications for strict vegetarians.
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That’d be me!
I don’t eat jello or marshmallows, for instance (gelatin-yuck!) Gelatin is even in some types of sour cream…
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What in the world is so bad about eating ground up insects, as long as it doesn’t look or taste like insects? There are people in the world who enjoy eating insects, whole and very much looking and tasting like insects. At one time I planned on being a missionary to some primitive tribe and I expected to have to learn to eat insects.
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Pauline, you are so impressively logical and surprisingly adventuresome!
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I don’t know if this is still the case, but some makeup used to contain bat guano (or in English, excrement, dung, digestive waste, etc. ).
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Momof5,
I grew up in a home where the only insects we were allowed to kill were mosquitoes (and my mother felt guilty about killing those). Stinging insects had to stay outdoors, and when the wasps built a home in our mailbox, my father got rid of the mailbox and cut a mail slot in our front door. The rest of them pretty much had free room and board.
Since I grew up with it, I more or less took it for granted – like the people who grow up eating insects. It did bother me to sit down to dinner and pick up my napkin and find a bug crawling around underneath it, but there wasn’t much I could do about it until I was old enough to take over some of the housecleaning myself (since my mother hardly ever did any). I still wasn’t allowed to use any insecticides, but I could wipe the crumbs off the table so the insects went elsewhere to feed.
The kind of things that scare me are what I didn’t have much experience with as a kid – talking on the phone, meeting strangers, telling other people what to do.
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I don’t eat jello or marshmallows, for instance (gelatin-yuck!) Gelatin is even in some types of sour cream…
Yeah, but now you’ll have to start checking ingredients for natural red dyes, and you’ll have to cross a lot more things off your list of things to eat.
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What are twinkies made of?
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Kristen,
I wish I had never opened this thread, that’s disgusting. I’m going to have a swiss cheese sandwich, hopefully there are no little parts of bugs involved – if there are keep it to yourselves – LOL
OP – don’t know, but I have a feeling you are going to share some dark secret – glad I’ve never eaten more than 2 – MAYBE!
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Sorry Victoria–I just couldn’t resist sharing the news!
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O.T. Don’t worry about Twinkies. There is nothing natural about them. Though I have heard that the FDA allows a certain amount of bug and animal parts in just about everything, so that may be a problem. When my daughter heard that there is a minuscule amount of rat hair and cockroach parts in ketchup, she stopped using it.
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Sheesh! Just think of where honey and milk come from. Some things are just better not to over-examine.
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19. What could be more natural than bugs and animals?
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People. Why do you think we thoroughly cook pork, and if your freezer goes out the meat grows maggots?
Shrimp, prawns, scorpions, crabs, spiders, lobsters, grasshoppers, dragonflies? All arthropods.
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Shrimp, prawns, scorpions, crabs, spiders, lobsters, grasshoppers, dragonflies? All arthropods.
And some of them very tasty arthropods!
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My favorite program is Modern Marvels that shows how stuff is made.
I was shocked to watch how gelatin is made … FROM BONES!
“Gelatin is a protein produced by partial hydrolysis of collagen extracted from the bones, connective tissues, organs, and some intestines of animals such as domesticated cattle, and horses.”
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When I was in high school, my friends and I worked for various factories in the area during the summer. As a general rule, none of us ever eats anything that was produced by that factory, because we saw how things are actually made. It’s best not to think about it.
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