Did You Know?
Awe, sneaky marketing tactics have been around for centuries. Before the internet and even newspapers, there were people who were selling snake oil to anyone that would listen. People who know how to manipulate their words to convince the consumer their product is the best for them. I was always raised to question everything and make sure you don’t get swindled by someone. What do you do when it’s the people you trust that are telling you the lies? We have been so conditioned over time to just believe the marketing and advertisements we see everywhere that what is being told to us is a fact. Especially when the ad has celebrities, athletes, government officials, and medical professionals in them, telling you their product is what your life is missing. How do you tell the difference between the truth and good marketing? As the vegan and vegetarian world has grown, businesses have noticed the shift and have adjusted the names they use for ingredients to fool consumers. As more people were double checking ingredients, they were noticing things like red beetles were being crushed to make red dye for food items. Since most people don’t want to eat crushed up bugs in their candy, companies started calling it by some of these names; natural red four, crimson lake, cochineal, carmine, carminic acid, Natural Red 4, or E120. It can be overwhelming sometimes knowing how many ways companies use marketing to change our buying habits without our knowledge.
Recently Trader Joe’s changed the ingredients in their Peanut Butter Stuffed Pretzels and didn’t tell anyone. The only reason I noticed was because the package now says Nuggets after the word Pretzels. When they first made the change, I say the text change and figured there had to be a reason why it happened. You don’t spend money to change the packaging on two items, (the salted and unsalted pretzels) without there being a good reason for it. When I looked at the ingredients, I noticed an ingredient I know wasn’t there before and I knew it wasn’t vegan. L-cysteine. Ever heard of it? Probably not and if so, it’s probably just because you saw it on an ingredient list but didn’t think anything of it. L-cysteine is a semi-essential amino acid found naturally in the human body. Abundant in protein-rich foods, L-cysteine is also sold as a dietary supplement (sometimes just called cysteine). Among the uses promoted for L-cysteine are the easing of flu symptoms, the treatment of certain inflammatory diseases, and the management of diabetes. It is most often derived from human hair or duck feathers and to a lesser extent from pigs' bristles and hooves. Tasty huh? Today, it is derived from Chinese duck feathers approximately 80 percent of the time based off an estimate of values given by several companies that sell and manufacture it. After seeing this ingredient listed on the pretzel package, I knew I needed to get confirmation that the ingredient was from a vegan source. Sadly, I found out that my favorite pretzel snack now has feathers in them. For some many reasons, this product change is unacceptable and makes me so angry. They were perfect before and now innocent animals are being tortured and killed so their feathers can be added to this item. Also, lets talk about the dirty marketing move by TJ’s to change the item and packaging but not make a note of the recipe change. They have to do that when they add an allergen to an item like milk, but not animal feathers apparently. I mentioned this to some of my coworkers who had no idea this ingredient even existed, let alone was in one of the company’s most popular snacks. A couple of days later one of those coworkers approached me about this topic again. She mentioned how unsettled she was by the fact she had no idea that ingredient was a thing and she wished there was a place you could go to find a list of common marketing terms used to fool consumers into unwillingly eat animal products. So here we are. I have worked hard to compile all of the ingredients with sneaky name changes so you can hopefully catch it next time when you are shopping. The more we take our money away from these items with unnecessary animal parts in them, the more it forces these companies to make the changes needed to the recipes and eliminate certain ingredients all together. It’s all about money and the bottom line to these companies. They most likely started using these ingredients because at the item, it was all they had, and it worked for what they were doing. Now with all these amazing alternatives, there is no reason to keep using the same ingredients past the fact they are cheap and don’t care about ethical work environments. Do you really want to give money to an item that not only has an animal being murdered for its feathers, but has you eating actual feathers every time you eat one of those pretzels? That should be reason enough to want to stop eating them if nothing else.
I hope this list is helpful and let me know if I missed any that I need to add. Let me know in the comments below if you had heard of any of these and what you think.
Thanks for reading,
Jessica
1. L-cysteine: A common dough conditioner, flavor enhancer in human and pet foods, and precursor in some dietary supplements is most often derived from human hair or duck feathers and to a lesser extent from pigs' bristles and hooves. At that time, the most common source was human hair found on the floors of Chinese barbershops. Today, it is derived from Chinese duck feathers approximately 80 percent of the time (estimation based on values given by several companies that manufacture and sell L-cysteine).
2. Natural Red Four, Crimson Lake, Cochineal, Carmine, Carminic Acid, Natural Red 4, or E120: Red dyestuff consisting of the dried, pulverized bodies of certain female scale insects, Dactylopius coccus, of the Coccidae family, cactus-eating insects native to tropical and subtropical America. Cochineal is used to produce scarlet, crimson, orange, and other tints and to prepare pigments such as lake and carmine. Cochineal has been replaced almost entirely by synthetic dyes, but it continues to be used principally as a coloring agent in cosmetics and beverages. Its dyeing power is attributed to cochinealin, or carminic acid, obtained by boiling cochineal in water. Cochineal also contains glyceryl myristate (a fat) and coccerin (cochineal wax). It takes 70,000 insects to make one pound of cochineal. **These are some other food additives that can be made from animal products. Make sure you double check before eating them. E322, E422, E 471, E542, E631, E901 and E904.
3. Confectioner’s Glaze, Resinous Glaze, Shellac, Natural Glaze, or Pure Food Glaze: This glaze comes from the hardened resinous material secreted by the lac insect (not the most appetizing source). It is mainly harvested from the trees in which these insects reside. You can most likely find this ingredient on candies that have a super glossy sheen, which is a result of confectioner's glaze.
4. Isinglass: A clarifying agent used when making wine and brewing beer. It is derived from fish bladders and is therefore not vegan. There's no way of knowing by tasting whether your beer or wine has been filtered through fish bladders, but many brewers and wineries list their ingredients on their websites. Barnivore is good website to find out if your wine, beer, or liquor is vegan. If you are at Trader Joe’s, you can ask them to look it up for you in their system. It should let them know if it is vegan or not.
5. Castoreum: This is an anal secretion beavers use to mark their territories. What does this have to do with food? Well, it happens to smell like vanilla. Back in the day, it was sometimes used as food flavoring for vanilla (like in ice cream) and used to enhance raspberry or strawberry flavorings, as well as a perfume ingredient. The use of castoreum in common food products today is exceedingly rare, in large part because collecting the substance is difficult (and therefore expensive). However, if a vanilla extract or similar product says, ‘artificial flavoring’, it could be anal secretion from beaver butts so try to opt for natural flavoring.
6. Casein: This is the chief protein in milk. It is found in the ingredient list of cream-based soups, sherbet, ice cream, margarine, puddings, also many products that are labeled “dairy-free” so be careful and always look at the ingredient list for this sneaky non-vegan ingredient.
7. Lactic Acid: This is an ingredient that can be vegan or not vegan. Although there are many vegan forms of lactic acid, there are still lots of “animal-derived lactic acid” on the market. Lactic acid is used as a food preservative, curing agent, and flavoring agent. It is an ingredient in processed foods often found in pickles, olives, sauerkraut, candy, frozen desserts, some bread products, fruit preserves, and wine. Always look to see if products with lactic acid have “vegan” on the front to be absolutely sure it’s not animal-derived lactic acid.
8. Gelatin: Is a protein obtained by boiling skin, tendons, ligaments, and/or bones with water. It is usually obtained from cows or pigs. Gelatin is used in shampoos, face masks, and other cosmetics; as a thickener for fruit gelatins and puddings (such as Jell-O); in candies, marshmallows, cakes, ice cream, and yogurts; on photographic film; and in vitamins as a coating and as capsules, and it is sometimes used to assist in “clarifying” wines. Not sure who the first person was to think this was a tasty idea, but they need to have their palate checked.
9. Oleic Acid or Oleinic Acid: This can be made from rendered animal fat. It’s often found in synthetic butter, vegetable fats, and oils, as well as many beverages and condiments. They are one of those sneaky ingredients to look for.
10. Vitamin D3: Can be added to fortified foods, as well as multi-vitamins and is derived from lambswool. As mentioned, D3 vitamin is used to fortify food and drinks like orange juice. Make sure you are getting your vitamin D by consuming Vitamin D2 since it is plant-derived.
11. Natural flavorings: Some of these ingredients are animal-based. One example is castoreum, a food flavoring that comes from the secretions of beavers’ anal scent glands.
12. White Sugar: In some countries, including the US, white cane sugar is filtered using bone char. Bone char comes from animal bones and this process gives the sugar its white color. Even brown sugar has the same problem, as it is simply refined white sugar with molasses added to it. If you buy organic sugar, this guarantees that bone char is not used. Also, there are many great brands that make organic sugar including Bob’s Red Mill and Trader Joe’s. Similarly, if a sugar is labelled as ‘raw’, ‘unrefined’ or ‘natural’ it is also vegan-friendly. Some sugars in this category include coconut sugar and date sugar.
These are the most common ingredients I find in everyday items, but for a detailed list go to the link here. https://www.peta.org/living/food/animal-ingredients-list/
