While we still delight in certain kid foods — looking at you, Cheetos and Yoo-hoo — some have grown less appealing with age. Our age, specifically.
Now that we have more sophisticated palates, the idea of a square of plasticky Kraft cheese seems downright icky. Kraft Singles — despite how “wholesome” the commercials claim they are — are to cheese what that yellow grease in those dispensers at movie theaters are to butter: a cheap, synthetic imitation. Kraft is trying to fight that perception, and the Big Food company announced Tuesday that it plans to change the formula of its processed cheese squares to eliminate sorbic acid, the artificial preservative that keeps them “fresh” in the bottom of your fridge after you’ve long forgotten them.
Kraft is the latest in the line of major food brands to announce changes in order to lessen the growing discomfort consumers have with chemical- and preservative-laden foods that crowd grocery shelves. According to Marketing Daily, Subway recently announced its removal of azodicarbonamide from its breads. The chemical, which is used to create elasticity in products such as yoga mats and shoe rubber, is used in bread doughs by McDonald’s, Burger King, Chick-fil-A and many others. In addition, General Mills reported early last month that it would engineer the Cheerios formula to exclude genetically modified organisms.
Increasingly, Americans are demanding more transparency and regulation of the food industry. Michael Moss’ expose “Salt Sugar Fat” was a No. 1 New York Times Bestseller, and the Pew Research Center’s food additives project examined the risks associated with Americans’ changing diets. According to Pew, since 1958 Americans have consumed an exorbitant amount of processed foods, which contain large amount of chemical additives.
The consequences of an under-regulated food industry have been tangible: The United States’ high obesity rate was at 27.2 percent as of 2013 and climbing, according to Gallup. And America’s increasing distrust in Big Food coincides with the end of brand loyalty; while McDonald’s used to be hailed as an all-American food destination, it’s now the butt of jokes and the target of blame on our country’s obesity problem.
“Today, consumers can read reams of research about whatever they want to buy,” wrote James Surowiecki for The New Yorker in an essay on the diminishing power of brand loyalty. “But what’s really weakened the power of brands is the Internet, which has given ordinary consumers easy access to expert reviews, user reviews, and detailed product data, in an array of categories.”
Today the same applies to food. If more pressure isn’t put on major food producers to lessen their use of chemical additives, America’s obesity rate will only climb — in addition to long-term health deficiencies from eating lab-made foodstuffs.
[A version of this editorial ran on page 6 on 2/12/2014 under the headline "U.S. food industry needs transparency, regulation"]
