It’s time to reveal the truth about five food impostors that have been living a big lie. These frauds have been sneaking into our diets with a false identity and it’s about time we caught them red-handed.
Just like you don’t stop loving your best friend after she tells you that your hair looks great on your worst hair day ever, this news doesn’t necessarily mean we must stop loving these liars. You may feel seriously betrayed, though. Brace yourself.
1. Wasabi
Photo by Sool Lee
That spicy green stuff on the side of your sushi plate is most likely not real wasabi, but a sneaky combo of colored horseradish and mustard. Real wasabi is traditionally made by grating the Wasabia japonica plant root into a paste. The deceiving horseradish mixture you’re being served in America is preferred by restaurants because it is cheaper and easier to produce and store than genuine wasabi. That’s fine and all, except for when you spend your entire life believing that your beloved wasabi is what he says he is – wasabi.
2. Oreo Cookies
Photo by Sool Lee
I think it’s time we ask Oreo’s to show us what they’re made of because, quite frankly, we have no idea. First of all, Oreos are vegan. That’s right, they contain no dairy products or eggs. Second of all, chocolate is the very last item listed in the ingredients label after a plethora of strange ingredients that we can neither pronounce nor use to deduce how these guys are actually made. What’s in that fabulous creamy center if it’s not cream? What makes them so magically chocolatey if they hardly contain any chocolate? The world may never know.
3. Bacon Bits
Photo courtesy of iheartnaptime.net
Or should we call them fake-em bits? Unless the packaging says “real bacon” on it, your bacon bits are most likely artificially flavored soy flour made to imitate bacon, containing no real bacon at all. This is great news for those vegetarians out there who just so happen to love bacon. For all you meat-eating bacon bit lovers, my condolences.
4. Velveeta “Cheese”
Photo by Kelli Haugh
Velveeta is designed to melt your heart as it melts into the perfect cheesy dip or nacho toping. The catch is that it’s not actually cheese. It is a cheese product, and is designed to yield a smooth, creamy consistency when melted. When natural cheese made straight from an animal’s milk melts, the heat alters the proteins within the cheese, causing the fat to be released from the protein’s hold. Cheese becomes cheese food when various salts, milk fat, whey, and other ingredients are added to alter the composition and consistency.
5. Aunt Jemima’s “Maple Syrup”
Photo by time.com
No matter how carefully you inspect your Aunt Jemima Syrup bottle, you will not find the word “maple” anywhere. That’s because Aunt Jemima’s syrup has nothing maple about it. The product is basically corn syrup; the first three ingredients are corn syrup, high fructose corn syrup, and water. Would you pour Aunt Jemima’s Corn Syrup all over your precious pancakes? Probably not. So Aunt Jemima and friends decided to leave out the details and let us all assume that our beloved syrup has some pure maple in it even though it does not. You’ve been fooled.
Are you feeling hurt? Confused? Betrayed? Learn more about fake wasabi, or try painting your nails like this to cope. Or, make your own perfect bacon to ease the pain.