Imagine you've just wandered over to the fridge in search of a snack. You're looking inside, the little fridge light on and the mysterious Refridgerator Fumes wafting out with their peculiar aroma. You spot that bag of chips - nah, that's 10 grams of fat per chip. You'll have that cup of yogurt instead, Dannon Light n' Fit raspberry flavour. Yum.
Not so fast, sweetheart. Did you know your yogurt contains dried insects? Check this out:
Food makers may not want to dwell on it, but the ingredient that gives Dannon Boysenberry yogurt and Tropicana Ruby Red Grapefruit juice their distinctive colors comes from crushed female cochineal beetles.
... [The] Food and Drug Administration is expected to publish a food-labeling proposal online today that would require companies to disclose when a food contains beetle-derived colorings including vivid-red "carmine" and bright-orange "cochineal" (pronounced coach-in-EEL).
Under current FDA regulations, food labels must identify certain man-made colorings by name, such as FD&C Red No. 40. But for carmine, cochineal and other naturally occurring ingredients, companies can use terms such as "color added" or, oddly, "artificial color."
There is opposition to this labelling thing, of course. Nobody wants to put "insect derivative" in their ingredient list, even if that's what it is. Their reasoning?
"It's not part of the requirement for other animal-derived ingredients. Lard is 'lard.' It doesn't say 'pork' after it. 'Milk' doesn't say 'from cow.' 'Butter' doesn't say 'from cow.'"
Whatever, dude. If "carmine" and "cochineal" is what you're calling beetlejuice these days, fine by me. I can memorise two new words.
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