Organic food in supermarkets

Edwardia

At less than 10% coconut milk, I think Koko has a nerve calling it coconut milk, frankly.

I contacted Trading Standards about New Covent Garden Soup Company Pumpkin g h o u l a s h I bought at Halloween. It was less than 10% pumpkin.

To my amazement, Trading Standards told me that as long as the product tastes substantially of the ingredient, it can be called pumpkin !!!!!ash. So calling your mostly water coconut milk is allowed

The grape juice concentrate is being used in place of sugar, but that doesn't mean it doesn't contain sugar. Grapes are one of the naturally sweeter fruits.

An emulsifier is there to bind the ingredients together in the form they are in. So in a liquid it would be to keep the ingredients in a liquid form and stop them separating out. Carrageenan comes from seaweed and wouldn't be a natural ingredient of coconut milk. it's being used as a thickener because there's so much water in the coconut milk.

I don't use coconut milk myself but OH has been known to cook with it for himself so I may have some organic tinned. Anyone else know any good additive free or organic brands ?

I would give them three or four working days myself or else look at local Trading Standards website and see if there is an official time period you're supposed to give for online order complaints.

Anyone else have any suggestions ?

sophlowe45

Hi Edwardia,

I did read your post twice before posting about the milk, and the second time I did understand it the way you meant it and you've explained again too.

I kind of meant I can read, so I think i've posted enough product ingredients here for a while, I just need to read carefully before ordering! Rather than being shocked and posting on this thread, I can't believe x product has such crap ingredients and i've been eating it for so long.

I think you should get on with the website you mention

I have creamed coconut (as Fire Fox recommended) but as i don't really cook, I may not get around to using it anytime soon.

http://www.biona.co.uk/product-272-4.html

I'm going to try Leksands Original Trekant - Triangular Crisp Bread 200g. Thanks for mentioning this Edwardia.

Yes thats broad enough organic, wild and additive free.

Did Mars bars really make a racehorse fail a dope test?

Edwardia

OH would go to the local ethnic store when he wanted a can of mushy peas or ravioli (it wouldn't be fair to say no you can never eat mushy peas ever again) and now he comes back saying I can't believe the additives in XYZ I bought the one with less additives.

I get really cheesed with the way manufacturers plaster no artificial flavourings, no artificial colourings on a tin then add glucose-fructose syrup or polyphosphates or something. It's so cynical.

I take the view that if they can make a great tasting product without the gunk then the reason they add it is to make more profit.. eg with the less than 10% coconut milk coconut milk. Some cottage cheeses don't have thickeners for example and are the same price/less than the stuff with them. Then there's juices made from concentrate so again much of it is water.

My mother and husband have been moaning about the lack of progress on the website. We are doing our first spring organic food hunt in another town next week so I will have to get photos up and reviews afterwards.

The Leksands crispbread is great, got OH and mother eating it too. Perfect for cottage cheese or peanut butter or just butter ! Definitely moreish

Yup No Bombs really did fail the dope test after snatching a Mars bar I worked in the thoroughbred breeding industry during my gap year and most of the people in the house I shared worked in racing. It's a racing story along with the one about the ultra successful racehorse trainer whose first wife ordered horse manure for her roses, as if there wasn't enough of the stuff about !

Edwardia

Ms_Night_Ryder says on the Westin Gourmet thread that she recommends Chadwick's butchers in Balham and that Jamie Oliver recommends them at his chef school in Clapham Junction.

Looked at the website and there's an online shop. Stanley Chadwick was a consultant on the movie Sweeney Todd and Chadwick's did after premiere catering for Lord of the Rings at which a journo dubbed the pies Hobbit pies.

Prices are mega expensive online, I guess you'd have to go to the shop to get cheaper stuff. Most of it is organic.

http://www.chadwicksbutchers.com/

Thanks to Ms_Night_Ryder for sharing.

Fire_Fox

sophlowe45 wrote: »

Great to have some more information on glucose fructose syrup.

I've just realised that Koko Coconut milk that I have been having for a long time has crap ingredients. Sucrose Ester???

Filtered Water, Coconut Milk (8.4%), Grape Juice Concentrate, Calcium Phosphate, Emulsifier: Sucrose Ester, Thickener: Carrageenan, Sea Salt, Vitamin D2, Vitamin B12, Colour: Natural Carotene

I will now stop posting ingredients of things I buy and focus on reading carefully before ordering.

Yes I am sure I have seen sugar listed in some prescription medications I have taken in the past.

I sent a follow up email to Ethical superstore asking what their complaints procedure is. Should I wait for 5 working days for them to reply?

Please keep posting them, everyone learns from each other here, I enjoy discussing with Edwardia and others. I've read my food for years (darn well ought to in my job) but I still have doh! moments when I don't check carefully. And it was only a couple of years ago I started reading my hair and skincare products, Then all :eek: when finally got around to it.

Speaking of sugar .... this seems like a good price on pomegranate molasses £10 for 500ml including postage, it was £30 plus postage when I added it to my wish list and still is on the company's website. AFAIK the molasses has no added sugar/ syrup it is just concentrated pom juice. Does contain plenty of natural sugars so no use for low carbers/ those trying to cut sugar. Google search suggests this brand is both tart and sweet, and you only use a tiny bit so I've treated myself to another random ingredient. :rotfl: http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B0057VT5HG/

Edwardia

I know the Cortas brand because I've had their tahina, Fire Fox. Not as good as Al Wadi Al Akhdar but better than English stuff.

Yotam Ottolenghi puts pomegranate molasses in dressings.marinades and dips.

bornintoit

Edwardia wrote: »

At less than 10% coconut milk, I think Koko has a nerve calling it coconut milk, frankly.

I contacted Trading Standards about New Covent Garden Soup Company Pumpkin g h o u l a s h I bought at Halloween. It was less than 10% pumpkin.

To my amazement, Trading Standards told me that as long as the product tastes substantially of the ingredient, it can be called pumpkin !!!!!ash. So calling your mostly water coconut milk is allowed

The grape juice concentrate is being used in place of sugar, but that doesn't mean it doesn't contain sugar. Grapes are one of the naturally sweeter fruits.

An emulsifier is there to bind the ingredients together in the form they are in. So in a liquid it would be to keep the ingredients in a liquid form and stop them separating out. Carrageenan comes from seaweed and wouldn't be a natural ingredient of coconut milk. it's being used as a thickener because there's so much water in the coconut milk.

I don't use coconut milk myself but OH has been known to cook with it for himself so I may have some organic tinned. Anyone else know any good additive free or organic brands ?

I would give them three or four working days myself or else look at local Trading Standards website and see if there is an official time period you're supposed to give for online order complaints.

Anyone else have any suggestions ?

What On Earth Organic Coconut Milk is the best one I've found, it comes in a tin, I use it for smoothies mostly. People tell me the tinned coconut milk is not supposed to be for smoothies but tastes good to me and it has alot more actual coconut milk in than the so called coconut milk drink versions. Someone on amazon has complained that this brand has a strange aftertaste, I have not found that but each to their own.

Ingredients are:- Organic coconut, water, guar gum

It doesn't state the percentages online (that I can find) and I don't currently have a tin in the cupboard.

Kirri

Interesting article on the Guardian today, will add link later if I remember/can find it again (was reading it in bed this morning on the phone from a Twitter link..) on veg box schemes, the reader comments are probably more interesting than the article.

Edwardia

Kirri, I found it for you

http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/wordofmouth/2013/apr/05/organic-box-schemes-growing-are-they-ethical?INTCMP=SRCH

Articles on organic food from Telegraph

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/9966462/Health-halo-effect-of-organic-food-can-trick-shoppers.html

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/health/dietandfitness/9940369/My-day-on-a-plate-Roger-Saul-organic-farmer.html

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/retailandconsumer/9904794/Ex-stockbroker-launches-organic-food-exchange.html

Edwardia

article on organic food from The Independent

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/business/news/organic-food-too-rich-for-consumers-8543163.html?origin=internalSearch

and from The Daily Mail

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-2302835/Organic-food-labels-trick-thinking-food-healthier-tastier.html

The other article on the organic food labels did make mention of people who have been eating organic for some time. I'm convinced myself that I can now tell the difference for some foods between organic and non orgnic.

If the scientists are so convinced that there's no difference why not use real organic food v non organic in the test ? And why not test people who have been eating organic food for say 6 months ? If anyone can tell the difference they can

To me, the point of eating organic food is not taste or nutrition because they are variables. The point is lessening exposure to chemical fertilisers. herbicides, pesticides, fungicides and genetically modified stuff.