MARCH 2009 GENERAL HEALTH NEWSLETTER
This month I want to draw your attention to
something quite interesting and in doing so, I
feel a little like Isobel Jones probably felt in
her heyday highlighting scams and swindles. I’m
talking about mince – yes, ordinary, everyday
mince.
The Big Mince Rip-Off
I decided to do my own little bit of sleuthing
this last week after reading a label on a mince
packet quite by chance whilst looking for an
electrical appliance in a supermarket. While I
was waiting for someone to help me (and this can
take some time, as you may know!) I found I was
standing next to the meat counter, and strolled
across to look more closely. I picked up
something that looked a lot like mince, and
wondered what all this writing on the label
could be other than “Mince”. Imagine my horror
when I saw that there was more than meat in
there….
Here’s what just two of the labels from two
different ‘grades’ of mince, (both from the same
supermarket) said:
Label No 1
says: “Ingredient declaration: meat, water,
cereal, vegetable protein, salt, wheat, protein,
sucrose, dehydrated vegetables, spice,
phosphate, flavourant, preservative: sodium
metabisulphite, spice extracts, acidifier!”
[Whaaat? Isn’t mince just meat?
Apparently not - this is a whole casserole!]
Label No 2
says: “Ingredients: Contains approx 5% soy
(soy?!!!), beef, water, textured soy protein,
salt, hydrolyzed vegetable protein, phosphate,
colourant, preservatives: sodium sulphite,
anti-oxidant.”
There are other outlets selling these scary
products, some even more scary in terms of
ingredients – but I’m going to stick with just
these two for this newsletter. Let’s see what
all this really means. Why would they put water
in? To make it weigh more no doubt, and they
can charge more for giving us less. What kind
of water is used I wonder – tap water, is it
fresh, distilled, filtered? Right here for me
the mind boggles. Is the mince left to “soak”
in the water for a legal length of time to
absorb a certain amount the way chickens are?
Perhaps.
Cereal is next (no doubt glutinous) – do you
imagine this is cornflakes, oatbran, floor
sweepings of bran husks??? Nobody knows….
Hydrolysed vegetable protein (this is a scary
one – see what this means in my book “Let Food
Be Your Medicine” – it’s all there in it’s gory
glory!) – but why do we need vegetable
protein if we have a perfect animal protein?
Ordinary ‘vegetable protein’ is also another
term for yet more soya. Then there’s
sucrose – this is sugar for those who don’t know
(do we need sugar in our meat?).
Dehydrated vegetables (no doubt rotten ones that
couldn’t be sold – but more vegetable matter
anyway, and in a form we may not have wanted
it), spice (which ones? And why?), phosphate (an
inorganic chemical – again why?),
flavourant (as if the meat doesn’t have it’s own
flavour – and these are toxic chemicals by the
way), sodium metabisulphite or E No E223, known
to cause allergic reactions, and be extremely
dangerous to people like myself who are
asthmatic; ditto for sodium sulphite – more
dangerous chemicals – and then antioxidant
(which is probably the BHA or TBQ ‘carcinogenic’
version!) – which is anything but an
antioxidant. And why would they use ‘spice
extracts’ and ‘acidifiers’?? And who wants all
that extra soy?
Imagine if you had diabetes, high blood
pressure, allergies or intolerances, ADD/ADHD;
or you could be suffering from Celiac Disease
where you are highly sensitive to gluten – but
there’s sugar, wheat, colourants, preservatives,
stimulants, salt, soya – and on the list goes in
this chemical, artificial goo you buy, thinking
you are buying a pure protein product!!! The
moral of the story is, I guess, that it pays to
read your labels. Next time you are in the
supermarket, look at all the mince products, and
read all the fine print. You might be surprised
– it’s a jungle out there.
March bulk purchases:
More new products this month,
Email
us
for our special Bulk Price List, and our new
monthly specials.
Spiritual Health:
"The things which are
impossible with men are possible with God."
Luke 18:27
BYE
Till next month, love & God bless from
Sally-Ann Creed,
Clinical Nutritionist
Dip
Clin Nutr
