Don't blame Kraft

I used to love Kraft Mac & Cheese. I kept those little single serve bowls that you could add water to and pop in the microwave around for quick meals. It was a go-to item when I was stuck on soft food. The "Homestyle" M&C was freaking awesome.  I've never been a fan of real home-made M&C for some reason, but I loved the Kraft stuff. The stuff just tasted good, and that was the main thing that influenced my food choices.  I think that is true for most people. I don't think most people WANT to know what is in their food.  We don't read labels because we probably wouldn't buy half of what we buy if we did.

If you are "out-raged" at the idea that Kraft includes ingredients in their Mac & Cheese here in the states that are banned in the UK, look beyond just the yellow coloring and realize that this is just one small example of a much larger issue. If you don't want the artificial coloring and other chemicals that are poured into our "food" you'll need to stop consuming pretty much every packaged & processed food item available on the market.  As great as I think it is that such a large amount of attention has been brought onto this one product, I think in the end people will overlook the bigger picture and focus only on this one product as "bad". It goes way beyond this one product.

If the Mac & Cheese debate has made you think twice about eating that product, take some time and really look at the foods in your pantry. Read the labels, specifically the ingredient lists and see how many of the items have some ingredient that you have no idea what it is or where it comes from. Then spend some time researching that item. Sometimes you will find that the item is no big deal and you might feel ok with eating it. However, more often, you will probably find that the items in your pantry include a laundry list of chemicals and ingredients that have been banned in other countries due to health concerns.  Whatever you do, let your out-rage come from education and not because someone told you that you should be out-raged.

It is not until you start making your own food choices and reading labels and looking at what is actually in your food, that you will realize the only way change will ever be made is when you change the way you spend your $$. It's all supply and demand. As long as the consumers buy the packaged crap the companies will produce it, so don't blame them for selling us crap.  They are simply a business, and as a business their goal is to make a profit, so to do that they need to sell more. To sell more they constantly look for ways to make food look more appealing (thus the coloring), taste more appealing (flavoring) and even to get you to eat more of it (MSG). As long as we allow them to sell us fake food they will do so. The only way to stop it is to stop buying the food. A petition is a great way to bring attention to the problem, but it doesn't solve anything. We can solve the problem by taking an interest in what we eat, and by choosing to NOT BUY fake food (or food that contains additives that may have harmful affects).

Don't blame the FDA, either. All the FDA really does , in regards to food, is set regulations in regards to labeling. They determine if something is qualified to be labeled as say "yogurt" and they set standards in labeling requirements (the inclusion of nutritional & allergen info, or that all ingredients over x% be included in the ingredient list). Unlike in the UK (and some other countries), the FDA really doesn't have much say in what can be put in or labeled as "food". They do put a little more effort into how drugs are labeled and classified and do require some testing to show that drugs work before they can be marketed to treat whatever illness they claim to treat (even that is questionable).  Unfortunately, I believe the name alone has lead many people to believe that the FDA in some way determines that the food that is sold is "healthy" and not "harmful".  We rely way too much on the government to protect us, when that is a job we should be taking responsibility for ourselves.