Please Pass the Real Food…

Friday, March 3, 2006

Page 11

AT THE SIDEBAR (Column)

Please Pass the Real Food…

By J’AMY PACHECO

I was sitting in a nice restaurant with my family, having dinner, when my husband made what sounded like a simple request: “Would you please pass the sugar?” he asked.

I reached for the small white ceramic container that held packets of what I assumed to be sugar. I pulled out a packet, but hesitated to hand it over when I noticed the packages in the container had different colored edges. This one was blue.

Upon closer inspection, I discovered the packet did not contain sugar, but instead was filled with what was labeled, “Sweetener.” “As sweet as two teaspoons of sugar,” the packet proclaimed its contents to be.

Returning to the container, I pulled out a yellow-edged packet. That one didn’t contain sugar either; rather, it was filled with something called “Splenda.”

I tried again, emerging with a little envelope bearing pink edges. I’ve been around artificial sweeteners long enough to know that it wasn’t sugar, either. A cursory read confirmed that it contained a “sugar substitute” that was “a blend of nutritive and non-nutritive sweeteners.”

It turned out our table didn’t even have any sugar. Our waiter brought some of the real stuff, which was, appropriately, contained in a pure white packet.

When did a simple thing like sugar become so complicated? Around the same time as granola bars, I’d guess.

A few days ago, I bought a box of granola bars in a box that boasted of the “Wholesome Goodness!!” of its contents. They taste okay, and appear to contain some fruity and nutty stuff, but I can’t help wondering what else is in there. What the heck is “high maltose corn syrup?” What does “glycerin” do? And what in the world are these “mixed tocopherols” that were added to maintain freshness? I probably don’t want to know.

Food wasn’t always like this. I remember when a person who wanted popcorn just popped some corn. Today, we open boxes of microwavable stuff that contain, in addition to popping corn and partially hydrogenated soybean oil, “natural and artificial flavor, artificial color, TBHQ and citric acid.” And this: milk. Who ever heard of putting milk in popcorn?

Years ago, my husband refused to buy a well-known brand of cheese spread that doesn’t have be refrigerated, melts easily and rhymes with “kell-meet-uh.” I loved the stuff, but if it was on the grocery list, he’d ignore it.

“It’s not real food!” he’d explain. While I disagreed, I did notice that the package labeled its contents as a “processed cheese food.” I was just happy the word “food” made it in.

After the sugar incident, I pulled a package of actual cheese from the deli drawer in my refrigerator. The label said the package contained “cultured pasteurized milk, salt, enzymes and annatto,” which I think is what makes the cheese such a lovely shade of orange.

I’m not sure what Ma Ingalls used to make cheese in her Little House on the Prairie, but this sounded like real food. Unlike the cheese-in-a-can that my daughter likes so much.

That stuff contains some expected ingredients – milk, water, whey (no mention of any curds to go with that whey) and salt. But it also contains things like sodium citrate, sodium phosphate, calcium phosphate, lactic acid, sorbic acid, sodium alginate and apocaroenal. Oh, yeah, and annatto. This cheese is also orange, and makes charming squirted flower shapes on crackers.

And speaking of crackers, mine contain not only flour, oil, salt and leavening, but they have an added bonus of thiamine mononitrate, riboflavin, partially hydrogenated cottonseed oil, high fructose corn syrup, and soy lecithin. Since these things sound sort of like vitamins, I think they might actually be healthy.

Curiosity drove me to the produce drawer, where I was relieved to see my bag-o-instant-salad contained only three things: iceberg lettuce, red cabbage and carrots. Although I feel some guilt remembering the days when I wasn’t too lazy to wash and shred my own lettuce, I was relieved that there was a good chance my salad wouldn’t contribute to a build-up of chemicals in my body.

In a perfect world, I’d forgo the pre-packaged stuff and grow my own food. Unfortunately, I live in a desert and don’t have a single green digit on either hand, so we’d likely starve. It looks like we’re stuck with it.

This over-processed food may do us in one day, but hey — at least we won’t go hungry.