Featured posts & Nasty Food product of the month 16 Jul 2007 07:00 am
Nasty Food Of the Month: Carrageenan
And how nasty it is!
Carrageenan is seaweed you know? So it’s natural, right? Ha! About as “natural” as MSG (which comes from rice), Splenda (which comes from sugar…kinda), and Aspertame (comes from oil). One finds it in processed foods: milk, ice cream, cottage cheese, yogurt, frosting, cheese spreads, baby formula….the list is quite long.
Long ago I started weeding out and avoiding foods that contained Carrageenan for the simple reason that it is an additive used to replace fat and gelatin qualties in foods that I preferred to have in their whole state. For instance, I think MILK should be MILK…pasturize it if you must but adding crap and homogenizing it is officially taking a whole food and making it a processed food in my opinion. Until recently I couldn’t/wouldn’t afford good, unhomgenized milk, but I had avoided Carrgeenan in ice cream, cottage cheese, yogurt…I make our frostings from scratch, we don’t eat cheese spreads, I breastfed the babies, etc.
But beyond just messing with something whole and making it a “recipe”, it turns out Carrgageen, and most especially the solvents used to process it, is a highly antagonistic additive. Consider some of these quotes:
Some folks can eat just about anything. Some people might
have no problem producing a tall glass of homemade soymilk,
then converting it to chocolate milk by adding the
following ingredients: Three teaspoons of sugar. One
teaspoon of chocolate powder. Two tablespoons of Vaseline
petroleum jelly. The Vaseline might produce gastric
distress, and the soymilk drinkers would erroneously
conclude that they are “allergic” to soy. Some people
do not experience gastric discomfort caused by the
Vaseline-like food additive, carrageenan. Many people do.Carrageenan is a commonly used food additive that is
extracted from red seaweed by using powerful alkali
solvents. These solvents would remove the tissues
and skin from your hands as readily as would any acid.Carrageenan is a thickening agent. It’s the vegetarian
equivalent of casein, the same protein that is isolated
from milk and used to thicken foods. Casein is also
used to produce paints, and is the glue used to hold
a label to a bottle of beer. Carrageenan is the magic
ingredient used to de-ice frozen airplanes sitting on
tarmacs during winter storms.
And from the same website, which is notmilk.com:
Carrageenan is a gel. It coats the insides of a stomach,
like gooey honey or massage oil. Digestive problems often
ensue. Quite often, soy eaters or soymilk drinkers react
negatively to carrageenen, and blame their discomforting
stomachaches on the soy.
Studies have been done that link Carrageenan to colonic cancer and gastro issues…hmmm, inflammatory bowel syndrome anyone? Here in our household we have well (ha haa) documented gastro issues of the rather pungent kind when nasty ice cream like Mayfield, containing Carrageenan, is consumed. Out here in our county, along with no wine, one also can not buy a brand of ice cream that does NOT contain Carrageenan. So we gave some a shot recently. BAD IDEA. On a much more serious note, our son Wheaton had an as-of-yet undiagnosed metabolic disorder as an infant and was not growing. The doctors surgically installed a g-tube in his belly and force fed him forumla containing high amounts of Carrageenan (not that they cared; it was the scientifically engineered nutrient content they were after). The more they insisted we pump through him, the sicker he became, the more mucous his body produced, and he nearly died. Rapid improvement occurred when we stoped feeding him the formula under a new doctor’s care, who wanted him breastfed and self-selecting his diet (which was all whole foods) while his gut healed. It was then that we started looking into food additives, most of which trigger our boys’ gastro-reflex issues.
During the latter half of the twentieth century, inflammatory bowel disease and gastrointestinal malignancy have been major causes of morbidity and mortality in the United States. Even with improvements in treatment and cancer screening, colorectal cancer remains the second leading cause of cancer mortality in the United States. The Western diet has been considered a possible source of inflammatory bowel disease and colorectal malignancy, and intensive efforts have been undertaken to study the impact of specific constituents of the Western diet, such as fiber and fat (1-3).
In addition to food additive uses, carrageenan has been used in cosmetics, pesticides, and pharmaceuticals, as well as in toothpaste and room deodorizers. It has been used as a treatment of ulcers and as an emulsifier in mineral oil laxatives, liquid petrolatum, and cod liver oil. However, its predominant role has been in food preparations, in which it is used across a wide variety of food groups because of its ability to substitute for fat and its ability to combine easily with milk proteins to increase solubility and improve texture. Hence, it is used in low-calorie formulations of dietetic beverages, infant formula, processed low-fat meats, whipped cream, cottage cheese, ice cream, and yogurt, as well as in other products. From its original use several centuries ago as a thickener in Irish pudding and its incorporation into blancmange, the food additive use has extended widely and cuts across both low-fat and high-fat diets. It is often combined with other gums, such as locust bean gum, to improve the texture of foods (12-14,22,41,42).
Inflammatory bowel disease and colorectal malignancy represent major sources of morbidity and mortality in the United States. A possible factor in the etiology of these pathologies is exposure to carrageenan.
The potential role of carrageenan in the development of gastrointestinal malignancy and inflammatory bowel disease requires careful reconsideration of the advisability of its continued use as a food additive.
Read the whole study here.
So my bottom line? My body was made to process FOOD. That is what I should feed it; not manufactured substitutes. Real fat is more digestable than some slimy chemical added to replace the fat, never mind all the nutritional and health BENEFITS from fat! Ice Cream should be Ice CREAM, not Ice CANCER-SLIME. Makes a real treat too, rather than a motivating force to run for the bathroom.
on 16 Jul 2007 at 7:38 am 1.carol said …
OH WOW! Just WOW!
We just got our soy milk maker last week. I’ve been making a quart and a half of milk, every day,every other day. I’d warned everybody to take it easy on drinking it ’cause it might take our digestive tracts some time to get used to it. I noticed right away that the uncomfortable side effects that I/we would sometimes get from commercial soymilk NEVER occurred from the homemade. Now I know why. Here I’ve been bemoaning the fact that I can’t get a nice thick homemade milk. I’m not doing anything wrong! Its the way soy milk is SUPPOSED to be. I’m sure thats why I can eat certain brands of ice cream w/o any issues and others send me to the bathroom for days.
GOOD ARTICLE, THANK YOU!
on 16 Jul 2007 at 8:53 am 2.gerry medland said …
An excellent article,thank you for taking time out to make us aware of hidden dangers such as these.Fortunately I purchased a soya milk maker last year and have had no bad effects since making my own milk.Once again,thank you so much!
gerry m
united kingdom
on 16 Jul 2007 at 7:32 pm 3.Blogging About Blogging » Time Keeps On Ticking Into The Future said …
[...] got my post up on Living Deliberately for the Nasty Food of the Month and just minutes later found a youtube video for an even nastier [...]
on 17 Jul 2007 at 5:58 am 4.Melinda McDowell said …
My son Wesley was diagnosed with Ulcerative Colitis, come to find out it was the Low-Fat Frozen Yogurt from Sam’s that I have been giving him.. very bad. Once he stopped eating the stuff all of his symptoms went away.. This is very bad stuff..
on 17 Jul 2007 at 10:55 pm 5.dalimama said …
Thanks for the info. I’ll have to see what it’s in. Luckily, we can get ice cream here that doesn’t have it but I am sure it’s in a few of the things we do buy and I’d like to do whatever I can to help my dh with his chronic indigestion.
on 18 Aug 2007 at 5:27 pm 6.Living Deliberately » The cryin’ shame of hospital food. said …
[...] carrageenan [...]
on 21 Feb 2008 at 12:16 pm 7.laura dahl said …
When will people get it! Eating whole foods is what our bodies were designed for. I just shudder when I see what parents put into their kids stomach. don’t they care or are they health dumb?
on 22 Nov 2008 at 3:35 am 8.Jan said …
I recently was diagnosed with Collagenous Colitis (Microscopic Colitiis, one of two of this type). I was informed by my wonderful naturopath to leave Carageenen alone and I agree. I don’t eat ice cream or most of the stuff it is found in as I’m allergic to eggs and dairy. Anyway, I’m looking for the other words to look for that mean Carageenen). I agree about eating whole foods…it’s not easy but it’s better than being sick all the time I’ve controlled my diarreah with a bland diet but still am getting sick.
on 10 Dec 2008 at 11:21 pm 9.andi said …
I had very painful bloating. My GI recommended having my gallbladder removed. I still had bloating. Went for a 2nd opinion with another GI. He ordered a blood test for celiac. Bingo! My numbers were very high for celiac. The upper GI also showed I had Barrett’s esophagus. I am very grateful that these two very serious disease were found before turning to cancer, but in spite of eliminating ALL gluten from my diet and following a reasonable diet for acid reflux, guess what? I STILL had the painful bloating. I finally determined that I had a carrageenan allergy and since eliminating it from my diet I have had NO problems. This process took 7 months. I think many people are misdiagnosed with IBS or something else and it is actually a carrageenan allergy.
on 13 Feb 2009 at 1:16 pm 10.Larry said …
In 2001 the Joint FAO/WHO Expert Committee on Food Additives (JECFA) completed a re-evaluation of carrageenan that began in 1998. The JECFA is an independent international body of expert scientists that functions under the auspices of the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) of the United Nations and the World Health Organization (WHO). Members of the JECFA Committee that reviewed carrageenan included representatives of universities and government agencies of the following countries: Norway, Australia, Canada, Finland, United States (FDA), Japan, Netherlands, Denmark, France, and the United Kingdom. During the course of the re-evaluation, the JECFA specifically reviewed the matter of the potential for gastrointestinal effects from ingestion of carrageenan. This included an evaluation of the effects of stomach flora on carrageenan, food processing conditions on carrageenan and the degradation of carrageenan in the stomach. Throughout the course of the re-evaluation, the JECFA considered genotoxicity studies, metabolism, reproduction and developmental toxicity, and short term and long-term mammalian feeding studies (including a 7.5 year feeding study in monkeys). The JECFA also considered information about the current understanding of the concept of cell proliferation and promotion of tumors.
In their review, the JECFA correlated carrageenan feeding levels (and effect levels) in test animals to human intake of carrageenan. This is lacking in the Tobacman review article. The JECFA estimated that the human intake of carrageenan is 30-50 mg/person/day. However, the JECFA concluded that based on the rat studies, if effects from ingestion of carrageenan were observed, the levels of ingestion far exceeded those of human consumption. For example, the JECFA noted that no proliferative effect of carrageenan in the colon mucosa was observed at 1.5% carrageenan in the rat diet. This corresponds to an intake of carrageenan of 750 mg/kg body weight per day, which far exceeds the aforementioned estimated human intake. To put this consumption level in perspective, this carrageenan intake level of 750 mg/kg body weight/day corresponds to a daily consumption of 58 gallons of chocolate milk per day by a 150 lb person!
The fact that proliferative effects were seen at 2.6% in the diet is moot because the estimated carrageenan consumption is below the threshold concentration for these effects. Further, the JECFA also noted that at 5% in the diet of rats, carrageenan did not act as at tumor promotor. Effects seen at exceptionally high levels of exposure to carrageenan were determined to be caused by altered toxicokinetics. See the adjacent table for a comparison of the estimated human carrageenan intake and the experimental carrageenan intakes noted in the JECFA review.
Overall, the JECFA concluded that there was no concern to the continued consumption of carrageenan and assigned it to the group “Acceptable Daily Intake – not specified”. This classification is used when the JECFA has determined that a food additive does not represent a hazard to health. It also allows for the use of the additive at the level necessary to achieve the technical or functional effect in food, also referred to as the level of Good Manufacturing Practices (GMP). The complete report of this review was made publicly available in 2003 and therefore post dates the review by Dr. Tobacman.
In plain english: Carrageenan can’t hurt you, no matter how much of it you eat, so stop whining about it.
on 13 Feb 2009 at 1:28 pm 11.Tia said …
Thanks for the research information Larry. But in plainer english…if it has to be studied on rats, I’d rather not eat it.
on 13 Mar 2009 at 10:12 pm 12.Wayne said …
I think some of you miss the point. Peanuts are generally regarded as safe, however they will KILL some people if they eat them as they have an allergy.
To some people a bee sting is an uncomfortable thing to get, to others it could mean life or death.
To say something is safe because some bigwigs got together and said it was, does not make it so.
Many things end up on the market that are later found to be unsafe. [just recently a certain plastic in bottles has been deemed unsafe after being on the market for years]
Think of all the meds that go through years of testing,trials, double blind studies and get released and are later pulled from the market because of problems.
Smoking at one time was considered safe. I think some people think things are safe just because it does not immediately kill you. We are consuming things now that years from now we will find out there is a problem because of the years of build-up in our systems.
Anyway, the main point I am trying to make is just because it is safe for one person does not mean another will not have a reaction or suffer from consuming it.
on 03 Apr 2009 at 10:23 pm 13.Laura said …
I just lived through a two year period not knowing what was wrong with me. I lost 20 pounds, and didn’t need to. I heard about carrageenan and eliminated from my diet. I immediately got better and started gaining weight. As long as it is not in my diet, I’m ok.
Some people have a problem with it. I just want people to know that it is a possibility so that they can check for themselves.
Does anyone know of anyone doing testing on carrageenan reactions?
on 03 May 2009 at 7:30 pm 14.Ruthie said …
Haagen Daz has no carrageenan and is delicious, however, fattening. The yogurt and low-fat ice creams also have no carrageenan.
on 26 May 2009 at 10:14 am 15.Lindy said …
I was taking a liquid cal/mag supplement that would upset my stomach right after I took it. I thought that it was an all “natural” supplement, then looked again at the ingredient list. The only thing in it other than calcium and magnesium was carrageenan. I stopped taking it and had no problems with my next cal/mag supplement. Yesterday I bought a chocolate soy milk and had the same discomfort after drinking it, not realizing that it had carrageenan added. From now on I’m not buying anything with carrageenan, or any kind of additives for that matter.
on 30 May 2009 at 6:15 pm 16.mary said …
I think I am very sensitive to carrageenan, not in my digestive process, but in my muscles and bones. They hurt and ache several hours after ingesting it. Has this happened to anyone else?
on 01 Jun 2009 at 4:19 am 17.Jason said …
I was sicked to discover I had unwittingly been eating carrageenan all these years. Anyway, I only buy Haagen-Dazs and Straus Family Creamery ice cream now. I can’t stand the slimy gooey melty texture of carrageenan-infused ice cream. I also make my own whipped cream at home using organic cream-with no carrageenan and it’s amazing! Great on pumpkin pie (hard to find pumpkin pie without carrageenan!) I hate xanthan gum so much. Stop putting these nasty slimy disgusting ingredients in our meat, dairy products, and condiments!
on 17 Aug 2009 at 11:58 am 18.K. L. said …
Larry, that’s not necessarily true.
I’ve been having digestive problems and the culprit *is* carrageenan and *yes it CAN* hurt you if you’re allergic to it. (Such as people are allergic to other “natural” things, like milk or soy or nuts.)
In addition it can trigger IBD, colon cancer, and other diseases in those who have susceptible GI systems or genetic dispositions.
Also, if it were completely “safe”, why would they use carrageenan as a provoker (of inflammation, among other conditions) in animals when testing?
(Such as in anti-inflammatory studies)
Suggested reading(s):
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/7751512
http://www.informaworld.com/smpp/content~db=all?content=10.1080/03670240390265175
(the bibliography of this, especially.)
_____________________
Good luck with eliminating it from your diet, everyone!
on 29 Aug 2009 at 11:26 am 19.Yang said …
I have been having allergic reactions to soy milk in this country for a while. I did not figure out why since I have no problem eating tofu, soybean or other soy products. In the beginning I thought it was soy milk itself. Then one day a friend brought me a jug of homemade soy milk. I had no problem what so ever. I also start to notice that when I was in China I don’t have any problem drinking soy milk either. So it became clear to me that my allergic reaction (itching ears and throat, tightening of facial muscle) must have come from the additives. A few days ago I bought some “organic” soy milk. The allergic reaction is still there. Now after reading this post I checked the content of the soy milk. Sure enough carrageenan is there!
I’ll be conducting further experiments (with myself being the guinea pig) on soy milk and nail this thing down.
Incidentally I have no problem eating seaweed or ice cream. So perhaps carrageenan by itself is OK to me. However, I suspect it reacts to something in the soy milk.
on 29 Aug 2009 at 9:22 pm 20.Pat said …
Whenever I eat even a half-teaspoon full of ice cream, my stomach does not tolerate it and I must spit it out. Is this an allergy to carrageenan? I have always stayed away from ice cream, even expensive brands, due to this embarassing problem. I also avoid whipped cream, creamy fillings, frostings, etc. Does anyone else have a similar response to ice cream? I am eager to try Haagen Dazs to test the carrageenan theory.
on 01 Oct 2009 at 2:03 pm 21.Meline said …
I also discovered in July 2008 that I have an allergy to carrageenan…sudden and severe enough to send me to the ER via ambulance!
It’s in most commercial cream products…that includes the cream products used in restaurants (cream dips, soups and desserts), and even private bakeries… and related agar is often used in fancy desserts to make them last/shine.
Re ice cream: In addition to Hagen Das, some Breyers flavors do NOT include carrageenan, include their “smooth and dreamy” 1/2 the fat line.
My experience has been that most frozen yogurts do NOT contain carrageenan…and while aerosol whipped creams DO, Cool Whip Free does NOT…
Also watch out for cream dips, prepared puddings.
Regarding cosmetics: does anybody know in general what type of cosmetics are most likely to have it?
For those over 50 especially: BEWARE: BARIUM enemas (used pre-colonoscopy) have CARRAGEENAN!!!
The moss that makes carrageenan reproduces via spores, and so it’s possible that other mold allergies may also apply (as they do to me).
And finally, is it more helpful to work with an allgerist or a GI MD?
on 11 Oct 2009 at 11:44 am 22.Safieh said …
15
, mary (30 may 2009)
Yes, i also have for quite a few years been experiencing bad pain in my joints . I eventually decided it came on after eating certain things, i started writing down the ingredients; carrageenan ,which i had no idea what is was , seemed to be the common factor. I was surprised and somewhat relieved to see that it is a fairly common troublemaker. It also causes me stomach bloating , and a phlegmy throat !
on 15 Oct 2009 at 5:19 pm 23.Soymilk said …
Please do your research everyone, but soy MILK and almond MILK isn’t natural either. Where in nature can you find these milks? Nowhere. Soy milk in particular is specifically bad for you, because the only way we should be consuming soy is in SMALL amounts and only in its fermented state. We should not be consuming tofu (unless fermented), soy burgers, soy milk, or any of the wide range of soy products that are mass produced. Soy is in so many things now, even in vitamins. Unfermented soy depletes the body of vitamins and minerals. Look it up, and always do your own research. PLEASE.
on 24 Jan 2010 at 10:29 pm 24.Nicky said …
Even if Haagen-Dazs doesn’t say it has carrageenan in it, it has cream. Cream has carrageenan in it. It will likely be in ice-cream, even if it isn’t listed, since ice-cream contains cream.
on 07 Feb 2010 at 3:14 pm 25.roberta said …
I was diagnosed with ibs. Had the pain and cramping and arthritic pain in my wrists. Stopped drinking liquid coffee creamer, and pains went away. Was allergic to carrageenan. anot ibs.
on 21 Feb 2010 at 6:03 pm 26.Alicia Fitzgerald said …
Last year I had a rash on my face that itched so badly I wanted to rip my face off. Being allergic to most things,I stopped and thought what have I eaten or taken recently? After 3 weeks on Nutrisystem, I Googled and realized I had an allergy to soy. Soy is in everything and had never bothered me before. The foregoing is just an example of how I seem to be allergic to everything and it’s so hurtful as my two daughters have gotten so my symptoms are like crying “wolf” again when I feel so sick I have to go to bed and lie there feeling more or less helpless. My painful acquaintence with Omega 3(not cheap version)
was red burning cheeks and burning, itching, red eyes and lids for 2 weeks. Not long after that, the eyes started again and it was from handfuls of sunflower seeds. For 3 weeks I have been sharing my daughter’s Almond Milk. My legs broke out in a red painful rash that itched like hell. Once a dermatalogist told me to use a cold milk soak on a contact dermatitis on my face and for years I’ve used it on an itchy rash with soothing, but not always helpful results. Now I couldn’t sleep because my legs itched so much - then I used cold skim milk on them and the itching stopped immediately, at least until I bathed. I also felt very funny in my head, my stomach hurt, I became “mental” and very nervous and stressed and started crying when my daughter came home from work or anyone spoke to me, and I felt so bad for 4 days I was in bed and would lose my balance when I got up. I began to think I was going to have a stroke. I wanted to see a doctor, but which one? And they rarely help and give an Rx that makes things worse. And I continued my rice chexs with Almond Milk, the only food I could force down. Then I started my Google search. Almond Milk was highly praised but I persisted and found an allergy forum for it eventually finding that magic word Carrageenan! I found this site today as I did more researching. Thank goodness I found the Nasty Food Of The Month on display. Thank you all for your comments, except maybe, Larry. It was truly like finding a needle in a haystack and my leg rash is still recovering and the job it did on my stomach. As I have eaten all the things with carrageenan, soy etc with no problems, I can only conclude that mostly it is a high concentration at one time for people like me, but the carrageenan is out!
on 21 Apr 2010 at 9:26 pm 27.Ali said …
I have struggled with painful cramping, bloating, and other digestive problems for the last 25 years. Around a year ago, I began seeing a GI to determine the cause of my pain. After expensive and sometimes invasive testing, we thought I had lactose intolerance, then Celiac’s, then IBS. After trying to cut out lactose, wheat/gluten, and other trigger foods, I was still in pain.
Finally, I took my diagnosis into my own hands. For 6 months I tracked everything I ate and when I had reactions. The final conclusion? CARRAGEENAN. I react immediately to this ingredient, and the pain can last from 2 hours to 24 hours. I have now eliminated Carrageenan from my diet, although I am continuing to find it where I wouldn’t expect it. I have begun to compile my own list of offending foods. If anyone knows of a more complete list, please share!
Foods with Carrageenan:
Ice Cream (except for Breyer’s)
Sour Cream (except for Daisy)
Cottage Cheese (except for Old Home)
Flavored Coffee Creamers
Chocolate Milk
Soy Milk
Redi-Whip
Pudding
Light Mayo & Mayonnaise
Salad Dressings
Slim Fast Shakes
Chicken (ex: pre-cooked chicken to put on salads, rotisserie chicken from the grocery deli, etc.)
Sandwich Meat
Frozen Entrees (ex: any entree with chicken, also random meals like Lean Cuisine’s pumpkin squash ravioli)
Buitoni pastas
Chip & Veggie Dips (ex: french onion, dill dip, spinach dip, etc.)
on 23 Apr 2010 at 10:28 pm 28.bo'nana said …
me too me too me too, and the ‘experts’ be hanged!
thank yyou soooo much to everyone who wrote- even Larry, who reminded me of all the reasons NOT to listen to the so called experts and their crummy ’scientific method’!
just becoz sthg cant be reproduced on RATS does not mean it is not having ill effects on HUMANS- rats are rats and humans are humans- and we put wayy too much stock in the information gotten through torturing rats, rabbits, guinea pigs, even monkeys- all animals not of our own species
my whole family has been having chronic gi issues for years now- so long i can no longer remember a time when no one of us was having pain, digestive disturbances, vitamin/mineral imbalances, IBS (even the kids!) etc. etc. And ironically- now looking back, i see clearly the escalation after escaping Dairy, only to succumb to Soy… we have painfully worked toward eradicating these foods (for us they are poisons) from our diets yet the damage is done and i think we may have problems all our lives.
oh well.
after dinner tonite i had 4 or 5 bites of a Lemon Pie from Shari’s, knew it wasnt the ‘best’ food to be eating but considered it a ’special treet’- until 10 minutes later when it all began spontaneously regurging. my stomach knew better than my brain, which took awhile to catch up… then i started thinking… and googling…
not for the first time, this has happened!
and not for the first time, CARAGEENAN came up. always ignored it before, we’ve had so many other foods we’ve had to eliminate (dairy- soy- oats- canola-etc) and question (wheat- corn- chocolate- egg-etc) and other additives (caseinates- HFCS- msg etc) to painstakingly watch out for…
besides carageenan at least is Natural, right? ?? ??? from seaweed and all that, yabba yabba… now whats this?
guess not.
something else jo/jane public have been lied to about, by Big Industry. again.
so now i am thinking, and looking back, and checking up on ingredients lists… and sure enough- CARAGEENAN is/was right there, most of the time!
Dairy? Carageenan!
Soy? ohh yeahh
Oat/Coconut/Almond milks? yup. yup. YUP!
Chocolate? depends… sometimes…
Frozen NonDairy GlutenFree desserts? YES!! EVERY ONE I LOOKED AT
stomach aches, wind, ibs, and upchucking every single time. also that ‘phlegmy throat’ someone else mentioned. yep- us too
what about that pie? …dont know for certain… but i’ll bet money. i will. my stomach said so and now that i can see the pattern, i think i will just have to ‘trust my gut’ from now on.
sorry experts.
a happy side note tho… Nancy’s Plain Yogurt and Rice Dream Rice Milk do NOT have carageenan listed. and neither of them seem to have bothered any of us, as long as we keep it to small amounts, once in awhile. (still dairy, and processed after all) Ditto to homemade whipped cream, but XXXD the can!
like alicia, i too have more research & lots of experimenting to do. but at least now i have a Hypothesis to prove. and no lab animals need be harmed in the process- i will be my own guinea pig.
Kudos Redheads, for your “nasty foods of the month”
KEEP IT UP!
on 16 May 2010 at 9:59 pm 29.Haydee said …
Thank you for sharing. I just found out Carrageenan could be the culprit for our unexplicable stomach ache and IBS. I grew up on home made soy milk and never had any problems. We switched to a processed Soy Milk (Silk) since we lacked the time to make our own and that’s when the problem started. We knew it couldn’t be we were allergic to soy since we have used homemade soy products for over 40 years. We are stopping the use of Carrageenan and hopefully the problem will go away. I don’t see Carrageenan leaving the market anytime soon if ever. It’s just big business it seems after reading the comments above and learning how many other products have it.
on 28 Jun 2010 at 11:14 am 30.Kiss That Milk Mustache Goodbye . . . Or Don’t « A Little Something New said …
[...] seaweed (I know! shouldn’t it be healthy?) that has its own following of controversies (http://www.sixredheads.com/2007/07/16/nasty-food-of-the-month-carrageenan/). As with soy, I don’t like controversies – so I’d rather just stay [...]