By Dean L. Jones, CPM

The last 11,700 years of the Earth’s history is referenced as the Holocene Epoch, which includes the development of agriculture, domestication of animals, invention of the wheel, development of writing, the Iron Age, advanced mathematics, the Industrial Revolution, space travel, and satellites that enable global communication.  All the same, mankind’s stupendous advancements are to some extent being disrespected by voluntary grisly eating habits.

Humanity increasingly chooses to disregard the importance of having a life-giving food supply.  Without questioning, consumers patronize fast-food establishments and eat whatever items claiming to have the best mouth-watering satisfaction.  This is where business literally reengineers food, as the latest Burger King offer employs a reduction of high caloric ingredients that it adds to its French fries and cleverly named their brand new item ‘Satisfries.’  Burger King’s Satisfries removed 30% fat and 20% calories from regular fries, and sells it for 20¢ to 30¢ more than the regular fries.

Burger King records more than 100 million customers each month, half of whom repetitively order French fries with their meal.  To capitalize on these titanic numbers, Burger King scientists add such things as modified starches to wet batters plus proteins, gellan gum, methylcellulose and soy and pea flours to make fried foods less absorbent to the frying grease.  In a way, Burger King is apologizing for their regular fries having so much fat and may be slightly risky to good health.  Thus, adding Satisfries sort of absolves Burger King from serving only unhealthy items and now they are able to offer a healthier version than the regular fries.

All the same, food engineers know the necessities of obtaining an appealing taste normally requires fat, salt and/or sugar.  So my guess is that processed sugar is at work to make this new fried item crispy, although it is not listed it surely is lurking nearby.  If not, we do know that ketchup uses a considerable amount of processed sugar and/or high fructose corn syrup, even though French fry eaters swear that without ketchup a fry is simply naked.

Sadly, our future food sensibility appears bleak with all the money spewing from KFC’s Double-Down sandwich that removed the bun leaving room for lots of fatty cheese, Wendy’s Pretzel Bacon Cheeseburger that comes with 680 calories and 36 grams of fat for the regular and with chili cheese fries it adds 530 calories and 28 grams of fat, McDonald’s ever constantly reengineering of foods from their vast 145 menu range from the Big Mac to Vanilla McCafé Shakes, Dunkin Donuts’ Glazed Donut Breakfast Sandwich nightmare, Pizza Hut’s Crazy Cheesy Crust Pizza plumpness producer, and the 1,140 calories and 67 grams of fat accumulated from Johnny Rockets’ Big Apple Shakes.  Concluding that mankind’s present trend of dim-witted eating habits may serve to hasten an end to what was otherwise a highly intelligent epoch.

www.SugarAlert.com
Dean Jones, Ethics Advocate, Southland Partnership Corporation (a public benefit organization), contributes his view on health attributes derived from foods & beverages.