You’ve probably heard about “pink slime,” the nutritionally questionable, ground beef filler treated with ammonia that has graced school cafeterias and fast food menus for decades. Well, if you thought that was bad, you haven’t seen anything yet.
Does it sound crazy to add pine needles to cookies or put eggs in your coffee? Well, it’s not that crazy as you think. The labels could be hiding the truth behind 20-letter disguises.
Here are nine more gross ingredients that might be in your next bite of food…
1. Maggots in Mushrooms
The FDA legally allows 19 maggots—tiny, rice-shaped fly larvae that feast on rotting foods—and 74 mites in every 3.5-ounce can of mushrooms.
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2. Chemicals in Salad Dressing
Big food corporations often add the chemical titanium dioxide – commonly found in paints and sunscreens – to processed foods like salad dressing, coffee creamers, and canned icing to make them appear whiter.
3. Wool in Chewing Gum
But that’s basically what it is: an oily secretion found in sheep wool. We mostly think of lanolin in terms of skincare products, but it is also used as a softening agent in the manufacturing of chewing gum.
4. Rodent Hair in Shrimp
Depending on where your shrimp comes from, it could be tainted with chemicals used to clean filthy shrimp-farm pens. Just as disgusting, farmed shrimp from overseas is often full of antibiotics, mouse and rat hair, and pieces of insects.
5. Beaver glands
You’ll find castoreum, the dried perineal glands of beavers, used as a strawberry, raspberry or vanilla flavoring in some candy, gum, gelatin, and pudding.
