Introduction: What are food additives? What does it do? Is it safe to eat? What are the common food additives? This issue of the column sister takes you to an in-depth understanding of food additives.
According to the definition in the "Food Additive Use Standard GB 2760-2014" (hereinafter referred to as the standard) promulgated by the National Health and Family Planning Commission (now the Health and Health Commission) in December 2014, food additives refer to "synthetic or natural substances added to food for the purpose of improving food quality and color, aroma and taste, as well as for the needs of preservative, freshness and processing technology." Flavors for food use, base substances in gum-based confectionery, and processing aids for the food industry are also included. ”
The standard stipulates that food additives can be used in the following cases:
From this, we can see that food additives are substances added to food for the purpose of improving the appearance, properties, and quality of food, or to preserve freshness, preserve, preserve, and facilitate food processing, transportation, storage, etc. It can be either a natural substance or a synthetic substance.
The emergence of food additives has greatly promoted the development of the food industry and is known as the soul of the modern food industry. Without coagulants, tofu cannot be coagulated and formed; without leavening agents, bread, cakes, fritters, etc. are difficult to fluffy, soft and crisp; without emulsifiers, the properties of candy, chocolate, and ice cream are difficult to stabilize; without preservatives, food will soon spoil and deteriorate, storage and transportation will be restricted; without anti-caking agents, salt, milk powder, instant coffee is easy to gather into pieces... It can be said that our lives are inseparable from food additives.
With the improvement of people's living standards, everyone is paying more and more attention to food safety, a variety of "additive-free" and "natural" foods are more and more sought after, and food additives are regarded as the enemy of food safety. Are food additives really that scary?
Let's look at the basic requirements for the use of food additives in the standard:
The first of these is "not to cause any health hazards to the human body". The standard specifies in detail the function of each food additive, the range of foods that can be used, and the maximum amount of use (or maximum residue) in each food, and some special also stipulate the method of use. Therefore, it is safe to use food additives in strict accordance with the scope and dosage specified in the standard, and there is no need to worry.
Food additives can only be harmful in cases of excessive or over-range use. Excess everyone can understand, that is, beyond the maximum amount of use or residue specified; over-range use refers to the type of food that exceeds the allowable use of the additive, such as the bleaching agent that can only be used for dried fruits and dried fruits, which is used in flour and steamed bun bleaching, which belongs to the ultra-range use and may cause harm to the human body. The terrible thing is not the food additive itself, but the abuse of the food additive.
The infamous "hanging white block", "Sudan red", "melamine", "clenbuterol", "poppy", etc. are not included in the list of food additives at all, these are illegal additives and are not allowed to be used in food. Many people mistake these for food additives, so they hate food additives, talk about them, and avoid them.
The rational use of food additives has brought a lot of convenience to our lives and greatly improved our living standards. For food additives, we don't need to talk about discoloration. However, it should be noted that the purchase of food should try to choose to go to the regular supermarket to buy products produced by regular manufacturers, and cannot covet cheap and buy three no products, after all, illegal merchants abuse food additives and even use illegal additives.
According to the different functions of food additives, the standard is divided into 22 categories, namely acidity regulators, anti-caking agents, defoamers, antioxidants, bleaching agents, leavening agents, base agents in gum-based candies, colorants, colorants, color protectors, emulsifiers, enzyme preparations, flavor enhancers, flour treatment agents, coating agents, moisture retention agents, preservatives, stabilizers and coagulants, sweeteners, thickeners, food flavors, processing aids for the food industry and others. Each class of food additives in turn contains a variety of different substances, and the same substance may also have multiple functions. Next, Xuejie took everyone to know some commonly used food additives.
1. Preservatives
Preservatives are no stranger to everyone and are widely present in all kinds of food, which can prevent food spoilage and prolong the storage period of food. When it comes to preservatives, the first thing that comes to mind is potassium sorbate, which is too common. In the supermarket, casually looking at the ingredient list or food additive ingredient list of a food product, there is a high probability that you can see potassium sorbate. Potassium sorbate has a strong bacteriostatic effect, and is easily available, low price, toxicity is much less than other preservatives, widely used in vegetables and fruits, ham sausages, aquatic products, soy sauce pickles, bread and pastries, beverage canned, candy preserves and other types of food preservatives. Its use method is extremely flexible, can be directly added to the food, can also be sprayed or soaked, is the preferred food preservative for many enterprises.
In addition to potassium sorbate, sorbic acid, benzoic acid and its sodium salts, propionic acid and its sodium salts and calcium salts, streptococcus lactate, sodium nitrate, potassium nitrate, sodium nitrite, potassium nitrite, carbon dioxide, etc. are also often used as preservatives.
2. Bleach
Bleach is a substance that can destroy and inhibit the color factors in food, make it fade or prevent food from browning. The use of bleach can improve the appearance and color of food. Common food bleaching agents are sulfur dioxide, sodium metabisulfite, potassium metabisulfite, sodium sulfite, etc., which play an important role in the bleaching of dried fruits, candied cold fruits, dried vegetables, pickled vegetables, dried edible mushrooms and algae, humus and other foods. Some bleaches can also inhibit the activity of enzymes and microbial reproduction, play an antioxidant and antiseptic role, can be described as several jobs.
3. Antioxidants
Antioxidants can prevent or delay the oxidative decomposition and deterioration of food ingredients, improve food stability, and many of the above bleaching agents can also be used as antioxidants. In addition, tea polyphenols, calcium ascorbate, sodium ascorbate, ascorbyl palmitate, etc. are also common antioxidants. Tea polyphenols are commonly used as antioxidants for food such as sauce-brine meat products, smoked barbecue meat, meat enemas, plant protein drinks, puffed foods, etc.; calcium ascorbate is often used for peeling or pre-cutting fresh fruits, peeled or cut vegetables, concentrated fruit and vegetable juice (pulp), etc.; ascorbyl palmitate is often used for antioxidants in milk powder, bread, instant rice noodle foods, ready-to-eat cereals, etc.
4. Colorants
Colorants can give or improve the color of food to make food more attractive, also known as food coloring. For example, caramel color, widely used in soy sauce, vinegar, jam, fruit and vegetable juice, all kinds of beverages, cocoa and chocolate products, beer, cooking wine and other food coloring. In addition β carotene, tomato red, annatto, lemon yellow, turmeric, red beige, etc. are also common colorants.
5. Sweetener
Sweeteners can give foods a sweetness. Although sugar substances such as sucrose, glucose, fructose, and maltose are also natural sweeteners, they are eaten by us for a long time and are important nutrients, so these traditional sugar substances are usually used as food raw materials, not as food additives. The sweeteners commonly referred to as food additives include natural sweeteners such as xylitol, maltitol, erythritol, sorbitol, non-sugar natural sweeteners such as steviol glycosides and monk fruit stevia, and synthetic sweeteners such as cyclamate, acesulfame potassium, sucralose (sucralose), and aspartame.
Although traditional carbohydrates provide sweetness, they are high in calories, while sweeteners are much lower in calories. In particular, synthetic sweeteners do not participate in human metabolism and do not provide energy, which is very suitable for diabetics and obese people to eat.
6. Leavening agent
Leavening agent is also a very common food additive, we should also be familiar with, is to make the product initiate the formation of dense porous tissue, so that the product has a fluffy, soft or crisp substance, steamed buns, buns, bread, cakes, fritters are inseparable from the leavening agent. Common leavening agents are sodium bicarbonate (baking soda), disodium disodium pyrosulfate, potassium aluminum sulfate (also known as potassium alum), ammonium aluminum sulfate (also known as aluminum alum), ammonium bicarbonate and the like. The usually said baking powder, baking powder, foam powder also belongs to the leavening agent, is a variety of leavening agents and other excipients composed of compound leavening agents.
7. Coating agent
The coating agent is a substance that is applied to the surface of food to preserve quality, preserve freshness, glaze, and prevent water evaporation. The name "quilt" may feel unfamiliar to everyone, but in fact, we are often exposed to it in our daily lives.
When it comes to fruit waxing, many people are disgusted, thinking that this is an illegal act of the business, but in fact, fruit waxing is allowed by the state, of course, the prerequisite is to use the food grade wax allowed by the state, and the dose meets the national standard. This layer of wax is the coating agent, the wax forms a protective film on the surface of the fruit, which can prevent the evaporation of water, preservation, antiseptic, insect-proof, and is conducive to the long-term storage and transportation of fruits. If not waxed, the fruit is easy to spoil, then many foreign or foreign-produced fruits we can not enjoy.
Food-grade waxes are generally made from the secretions of natural animals and plants, such as carnauba wax, which can be used as a coating agent for fresh fruits, and can also be used to coat the surface of chocolate and candy, making their color more bright and not easy to adhere to each other. In addition, beeswax, lac (also known as shellac), chitosan polyethylene glycol, polyvinyl alcohol, etc. can also be used as a coating agent for food, and the range of food that can be used by different coating agents is also different.
In addition to the above introduction, there are many more food additives, which will not be listed here. In short, the existence of food additives is to make us eat better, rational use of them can improve the flavor and quality of food under the condition of ensuring safety, I hope that everyone correctly understands food additives, do not have to label them "harmful" and "unhealthy".
Resources:
1. Standard for the Use of Food Additives (GB2760-2014)
2. Food Interesting Website (www.foodu14.com)
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