olikli wrote:I don't think it's good practice to suggest harmfulness if it hasn't been proven yet. And E 150d is in the same carcinogen leauge as acrylamide in chips or nitrosamins and polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons in a grilled piece of meat. So eating a burger with chips and a coke will cause triple cancer.
'Proven' and 'accepted' are quite different things.
olikli wrote:I suspect the carcinogen qualities of alcohol to be stronger as any kind of caramel anyway.
Then that means it's quite acceptable to add it to our alcohol then. We can increase the risk by adding a pointless additive.
A common quote -
Caramel coloring is burnt sugar. Ask any biologist about burnt sugar, and he will tell you that it is a carcinogen. Additionally, scientists have used caramel coloring in lab experiments on mice to interfere with leukocyte action (white cells). In other words, caramel coloring is immunosuppressive. The FDA knows this and insures that anything containing caramel coloring must note this on the label. Just luckily, this immunosuppressive property of caramel coloring drops away when you quit ingesting it.
From a UK site -
"In 1880, Charles Sethness, a 25 year old self-educated immigrant, started a flavor and syrup business in Chicago. Within a few years, he was heating sugar in iron kettles to produce caramel color for whiskey. Today, his grandsons and great grandsons run the Sethness Products Company, the world’s leading supplier of caramel color. Although the single largest use of caramel color is soft drinks, it is also used in an incredible number of other foods. Today, caramel color is manufactured by heating corn syrup, usually under pressure, in large stainless steel reactors."
I also learned that there are four classes of caramel color based on chemical additives:
· Class I Caramel Color (no additives low sulfites)
· Class II Caramel Color (sulfite additives very high sulfites)
· Class III Caramel Color (ammonia additives low sulfites)
· Class IV Caramel Color (sulfite and ammonia very high sulfites)
It seems that some caramel colorings are worse than others, depending on their chemical additives. Manufacturers are required to list caramel coloring when they use it, but they are not required to list the class.
Acrylamides may be more comparable to E150a than E150d ( or not ). Besides it's all about reducing risk.
Laboratory tests highlighted acrylamides as a possible danger five years ago, but the University of Maastricht study, published in the journal Cancer Epidemiology, Biomarkers and Prevention, is the first to find a link between acrylamides in the diet and cancer risk.
Food which has been coloured or burned by cooking is far more likely to contain acrylamides.
Food experts say it is virtually impossible to eliminate them from our diets altogether.
The Dutch study followed the 120,000 volunteers - 62,000 of whom were women - for 11 years after their initial questionnaire, during which time 327 of them developed endometrial (womb) cancer, and 300 developed ovarian cancer.
Analysis of these findings suggested that those who ate 40 micrograms of acrylamide a day - equivalent to half a pack of biscuits, a portion of chips or a single packet of crisps - were twice as likely to fall prey to these cancers compared with those who ate much less acrylamide.
Despite the size of the study, the researchers said that the results needed to be confirmed by other research.
An EU spokesman said: "General advice, resulting from this project, is to avoid overcooking when baking, frying or toasting carbohydrate-rich foods.
). But e150 is just an additive and not an ingredient ( although i accept that the shady organisations tell us it's harmless ).
).
