Swallow This

by Joanna Blythman

  The catholic collection of substances from which commercial enzymes may be harvested should clearly raise ethical issues. Observant Muslims, Jews and vegans would be horrified to learn, for instance, that the phospholipase used to make their bread was once derived from pig’s pancreas. They need never know, however, because neither the presence of enzymes, nor their source material, need be disclosed.

  Once the raw materials are sourced, how are commercial enzymes made? The production involves large-scale fermentation in tanks with capacities of up to 150,000 litres. The contents are referred to in the enzyme business as a ‘broth’. But what is in the recipe? The European Commission observes: ‘Details of components used in industrial-scale fermentation broths for enzyme production are not readily obtained. Not surprisingly, as manufacturers do not wish to reveal information that may be of technical or commercial value to their competitors.’ As for ordinary people, if the regulators are struggling, we haven’t a hope in hell of discovering what went into the enzyme soup. Likely ingredients, however, are waste materials and by-products from the food and agricultural industries, materials as diverse as sugars, sulphite liquid from cellulose production plants, hydrolysed [chemically broken down] wood and starch, fruit juices, potatoes, phosphates, soya meal, dairy, meat and vegetable proteins, derivatives of ammonia, cotton seed, corn-steeping liquid and fish meal. Usually, the raw materials are dissolved or suspended in water, and heated. The enzymes are secreted into the fermented broth.

  From the broth stage, the disrupted cells go through further purification steps. The European Commission describes these as follows in its usual all-embracing, comprehensive manner: ‘A variety of chemical, mechanical and thermal [heat] techniques (concentration, precipitation, extraction, centrifugation, filtration, chromatography).’ The resulting enzyme concentrate is then sold to food and drink companies in various forms – liquids, slurries, granules and powders – depending on what is required, preparations that contain additives to stabilise the enzyme activity and act as preservatives.

  Need the soupy, hazy pedigree of the enzymes used to make our food and drink cause us any concern? The enzyme industry would argue that we should continue to enjoy the fruits of enzyme technology without a care in the world. But how much confidence should that give us? Bear in mind the cautionary tale of azodicarbonamide and potassium bromate. For decades, bakers were shovelling these chemical additives into their products, on the basis that they had been granted Generally Regarded As Safe (GRAS) status from regulators. Belatedly, European regulators got round to banning them when the scientific case against them became too glaring to ignore. The former was linked to respiratory problems, allergies and asthma; the latter is thought to be carcinogenic. Both of these have been replaced by – guess what? – supposedly safer enzymes. Safe for how long? As artisan baking expert Andrew Whitley wryly observes, ‘safety assurance has a short shelf life’.

  Can we trust that factory-made enzymes are safe? The enzyme industry’s tight-lipped lack of transparency doesn’t exactly build confidence. When the European Commission asked the Austrian Federal Environment Agency to assemble a collection of information on enzymes, the research team made a point of noting tactfully in its final report the lack of co-operation it had received from enzyme companies:

  The project team explicitly acknowledges the efforts made by some individual representatives of industry to provide information, however, also regrets not having received all data requested from industry.

  The team notes how initially, ‘co-operation with industry was very promising’ but ultimately, even after giving the industry more time to supply data that would answer its questions, ‘these data were not provided by industry’. So the project team had to base its conclusions mainly on relatively limited data available from other sources. On key issues, such as whether genetic engineering has different impacts on the properties of enzymes, the team pointed out that available data sources were ‘very narrow’.

  It is well known that enzymes can trigger health problems in people. Biological ‘bio’ washing powders, for example, can cause skin irritation. Itchy skin is relatively trivial, but as potential allergens, enzymes can have more dramatic effects if inhaled as a dust. Enzymes are a well-documented occupational hazard for those who work in industrial bakeries; workers in such environments are usually screened for allergies and respiratory problems, and having passed these checks, are required to wear protective clothing and impervious gauntlet gloves. Once an individual has developed an immune response to the enzyme, re-exposure produces increasingly severe responses that can be dangerous or even fatal. What begins as a runny nose, or soreness of the fingertips, can develop into breathing difficulties and, in rare cases, severe anaphylactic shock, which can prove fatal. This is why dry, dusty enzyme preparations are being replaced by liquid or granular ones where the enzymes are said to be ‘immobilised’. Even so, enzyme companies usually recommend to food and drink manufacturers that employees working with liquid enzymes use eye protection to avoid splashes.

  What effects might enzymes have on people who eat and drink products made with them? Potential impacts on the health of consumers of such products, as well as the people who make them, cannot be ruled out. European Commission researchers point out that although there is at present no evidence of reactions to eating enzymes in food, in theory, such sensitisation could occur. What’s more, many enzymes have been specifically designed to remain highly stable during the heat and stress of food and drink production processes, which means that they ‘could more easily pass through the intestine without being fully degraded or denatured’. One such example is fungal alpha-amylase: a study has found that 20 per cent of its allergenicity can survive in the crusts of bread. Another example is transglutaminase, which is used in bread and pastries, such as croissants, to make the dough more elastic, and also to bond low-quality meat products. One group of researchers has found that it can generate the epitope [part of molecule] responsible for coeliac disease. Proteases, a class of enzymes that makes particularly effective detergent, are commonly used in industrial baking and for meat tenderising. These are the most likely to cause allergies and sensitivities because they have the easiest access to the bloodstream through soft tissues.

  It is also theoretically possible that allergenic enzymes, even if not present in the final product, could contaminate the factories where they are used. The vast majority of product recalls that food manufacturers are forced to make concern conventional allergens, such as nuts and soya, which have lingered on in the wrong place at the wrong time. Even with the most scrupulous manufacturing precautions, allergens have a habit of turning up like the proverbial bad penny, because they are difficult to control in an industrial plant environment.

  Allergies apart, no enzyme has yet been shown to be toxic, mutagenic or carcinogenic, but it is accepted that residual contaminants, derived from the enzyme source itself, or produced during processing, such as mycotoxins and aflatoxins, could be a health hazard. In the USA, enzymes must have Generally Regarded As Safe (GRAS) status, for what that’s worth. In the UK, enzymes used in food are classed as ‘substances that the available evidence suggests are acceptable for use in food’. Note that mealy-mouthed, damage-limiting, covering-my-back phrase ‘available evidence suggests’. As we know from the experience of the team tasked by the European Commission with collecting data on enzymes, not enough information is available to draw deeply informed conclusions. It is almost as if regulators have been unable to keep up with the speed at which enzymes are being developed, or form a full picture of their long-term implications.

  For legislative purposes, commercial enzymes are treated as ‘natural’. Any testing that has taken place is narrow and restrictive, looking at each enzyme in isolation with an obstinate tunnel vision. No serious attention has been given to the fact that enzymes, most notably in baking, are often used in compound mixes of up to five at a time, along with other chemical additives, and coyly named as ‘improvers’. W
hat might the cocktail effect of such enzyme and chemical mixes be? How might they multiply the allergen and toxin risk? No regulatory body appears to have given this any serious consideration.

  But why should this cause us a minute’s concern? Speaking for enzyme companies, the European Food Information Council argues that ‘the concept of acceptable risk is intrinsic to the notion of pushing back the frontiers [of science]’. Of course, the issue for most people is, ‘Do I and my family really want to be part of a human experiment at the cutting edge of enzyme technology?’ Don’t spend too long thinking about that question. You aren’t being consulted on the question, and so, to all intents and purposes, your opinion doesn’t matter.

  13

  Old

  The word ‘fresh’ can be relied upon to conjure up positive images. Used honestly and accurately, it is an epithet that fits the perky greenness of recently harvested vegetables, a handful of cut herbs from the garden, or fruit just picked in the orchard. It conveys the sense of food prepared and consumed the same day, without any refrigeration: newly fired pizza, a Sunday dinner cooked in the late afternoon and eaten in the early evening, a just-baked scone, a stir-fry hot from the wok. At a stretch, fresh can describe ingredients that have been lightly processed: a kipper still warm from the smokehouse, even a pat of newly churned butter. Yet the word ‘fresh’ is used by food retailers and manufacturers in an entirely different way: to refer to products that have undergone some treatment to prolong their edible life.

  If you stop to think about it, this usage is a contradiction in terms. ‘Fresh’ is, or ought to be, time sensitive. By its very nature, freshness is a fleeting and finite state, a concept located at the top end of a timescale that inevitably leads downwards to decomposition and decay. For food manufacturers and retailers, however, the word ‘fresh’ has assumed an obligingly elastic meaning. They sell us chilled food and drink under the banner of fresh – ready meals, dips, salads, sandwiches, fried fish, soups, smoothies, cooked meats, spreads, cook-in sauces, pizza, desserts, chicken nuggets – and give it a use-by date that leads us to believe that they will stay like this for days at a time.

  By rights, the confused notion of fresh food that lasts some considerable time should be oxymoronic, but in food manufacture, freshness has become synonymous with a more truthful, accurate term: ‘shelf-life extension’. A number of more and less sophisticated technologies have been developed with the sole purpose of making food last longer. As a consequence old, tired food masquerading as fresh has become a big part of our diet.

  Over 80 additives that have a preservative effect are approved in Europe. Each has an E number, the tell-tale badge that indicates to consumers they are man-made. The chemical industry tries doggedly to convince us that any instinctive hostility to such preservatives merely reflects the scientific illiteracy of the general public. The Food Additives and Ingredients Association (FAIA, http://www.faia.org.uk), a body representing chemical companies that make these additives, attempts to relax us by telling us that many of them are just ‘synthetic copies of the natural [preservative] products that are present in nature’. If we only understood more about them, we wouldn’t be so reluctant to consume them, we’re told. So what are they?

  First up are those classed as preservatives: benzoates (such as sodium benzoate, sodium ethyl p-hydroxybenzoate), nitrites and nitrates (such as potassium nitrite, sodium nitrate), sorbates (such as sodium sorbate, potassium sorbate), sulfites (such as potassium metabisulfite), and propionates (such as calcium propionate, propionic acid). This class of preservative turns up in many products, from muffins, through processed meats and mango juice, to milkshakes.

  Clearly, this motley crew doesn’t go down too well with the ‘no chemicals brigade’ – a food industry term of derision for people who routinely avoid additives and obscure ingredients with unfamiliar names. Such preservatives are, as one food engineer tactfully puts it, ‘quite chemical in nature’, and the fact that they can cause health problems is beyond dispute. The additive industry itself admits that sulfites, and benzoic acid and its derivatives, can trigger breathing difficulties, shortness of breath, wheezing and coughing in sensitive individuals. Strong evidence suggests that consumption of the preservative sodium benzoate, in tandem with certain artificial food colours, could be linked to increased hyperactivity in children. These relatively minor reactions pale into insignificance when you consider the well-recorded impacts of the nitrates that have become standard kit in processed meats. Converted by bacteria in saliva to nitrates, these then react with various amines in the stomach to form nitrosamines, which are potent carcinogens.

  Next in line in the assembled ranks of shelf-life extenders are antioxidants. These might appear more benign than the preservatives mentioned above, even beneficial, because relatively few people appreciate that they are quite a different kettle of fish from the natural antioxidants in raw food that disarm cell damage-causing free radicals. Ascorbic acid is the personable ambassador thrust forward to speak for this category, and regularly introduced as vitamin C by another name. But this is misleading. Ascorbic acid is made industrially in factories, often by the fermentation of GM corn, by triggering a series of chemical reactions. So the ascorbic acid that draws attention away from the woeful nutritional profile of fruit ‘drinks’, or nutrient-denuded breakfast cereals and breads, is a one-dimensional, man-made copy of natural vitamin C found in whole foods, such as oranges and kale. While vitamin C in real food is always accompanied by other micronutrients that act in synergy to enhance its effect, ascorbic acid is an isolated, man-made chemical, and as such, is unlikely to have the same health-boosting effects as natural vitamin C. The same reservation applies to another group of antioxidants, tocopherols: alpha-tocopherol, gamma-tocopherol, delta-tocopherol, mixed tocopherols. These chemically manipulated, synthesised versions of natural vitamin E are usually derived from petrol. Synthetic vitamins are not as well absorbed in the body as natural ones.

  The antioxidant line-up looks uglier still when you glimpse other lower profile personalities skulking in the ranks, additives that turn up like clockwork in crisps, crackers, chips, margarine, processed meats, and foods fried in oil, such as chicken Kievs, falafels and fish fingers. Meet butylated hydroxytoluene (BHT), which is also an ingredient in embalming fluid and jet fuel, butylated hydroxyanisole (BHA), a common component of rubber and petroleum products, propyl gallate, often used to make glues, and tert-butylhydroquinone (TBHQ), which finds another purpose in the making of varnish. A lively scientific debate surrounds these antioxidants because several studies have found they have adverse effects on laboratory animals – cancer, disruption to hormones and the nervous system, and more. However, in their infinite wisdom, our regulators have concluded that the presence of these additives, at the levels permitted, represents no risk to human health. The need of food processors to postpone the evil hour when their products start showing their age trumps public health concerns every time.

  You can see why acronyms are necessary – these additive names don’t exactly trip off the tongue. Nor do they inspire consumer confidence. And why should they? The knowledge that many food additives have the capacity to shorten the lives of humans, as well as extend use-by dates, is built into European law. This is why regulators have set a maximum ‘acceptable daily intake’ for each one, based on the ‘no-observed-adverse-effect level’ which, we are told, is a ‘safe’ limit based on animal experiments. Researchers observe what dose laboratory animals can take of a substance before showing obvious signs of illness, or dying, and then extrapolate from this the likely effects on humans. But this is an informed estimate; no one really knows how much of a carcinogen it takes to cause cancer, or how much of a toxin it takes to poison your nervous system.

  According to the European Food Information Council (EUFIC) – a body that presents itself as a ‘science-based’ information body on food, but which functions as a food industry lobby group – acceptable daily intakes include ‘a large margin of sa
fety and refers to the amount of a food additive that can be taken daily in the diet, over a lifetime span, without any negative effect on health’. Fine and dandy, if you take on trust assurances from the food industry’s men in white coats, but then many of us don’t. The public appetite for an alphabet soup of additives has shrunk.

  Much more effective in softening up doubting consumers has been the fiction, fostered by the processed food industry, that the main reason for using preservative additives is to make foods safer. In this storyline, preservatives are presented as front-line fighters protecting us from poisoning and death. This is how the EUFIC frames the argument:

  The greatest threat to consumers is that of food being spoiled, or from becoming toxic by the effect of micro-organisms (e.g. bacteria, yeast, moulds) occurring in them. Some of these organisms can secrete poisonous substances (‘toxins’), which are dangerous to human health and can even be fatal.

  This ‘use a toxin to kill a toxin’ propaganda has been tacitly reinforced by the health and safety establishment. It has groomed us to see natural, unprocessed food as a seething mass of sinister bacteria that can only be rendered safe by the controlling hand of technology. Case in point, under the tabloid-style headline ‘Kitchen sink squalor’, NHS Choices warns us that ‘most people think of the toilet as the most contaminated part of the house, but in fact the kitchen sink typically contains 100,000 times more germs than a bathroom or lavatory’. Scary or what? This is typical of the tone of government food hygiene advice, wherein home cooks are portrayed as dangerously ignorant, exposing their nearest and dearest to life-threatening hazards. In government food hygiene campaigns, no mention is made of the much more extensive food poisoning risks routinely run in factory food production, or of how the modern food distribution system can facilitate the spread of a problem to thousands of homes, thousands of miles away, in a matter of hours.