Interpreting the labeling of foods is very important to really know what they’re buying and what we are paying.

It is curious to observe how more and more people who look at the product ingredients. Some people looking to know the nutritional content, calories, origin, expiration date, but perhaps the main reason is that more and more people allergic to certain foods or food additives.

One major problem found with these people is that “decode” the labels is a very complex task in many cases.

• Firstly no one tells us that the order in which they appear ingredients indicates the proportion of the food, from highest to lowest. If we know that now we know why, for example, two raspberry jam can have such different prices. In a boat, we see that the raspberry goes first (indicating that is the most abundant ingredient) and in the other jar is equal second after the sugar (this boat should be cheaper because it is mostly sugar that is much cheaper than raspberry) Besides the price is also interesting when we want to avoid taking an ingredient or at least the minimum amount.

  If for example we do not take sugar, but we see appearing in the last or second to last ingredient, the truth is that just take sugar, but are included in the first or second will contain a lot of quantity. For people allergic to an ingredient (eg cow’s milk) which correctly indicates that contain milk or can not afford life literally. For other people can make a rash, headache, diarrhea or other symptoms. We are really talking about something very serious.

• Another issue is the nomenclature. This is very important with the additives. Depends on which country gets the letter E and the number of additive or the name of it (eg E-202 or potassium sorbate) Sometimes we talk about monosodium glutamate and others, however, say autolysed protein. Although not always easy, for reasons of space, you should always cite additives by name and that no consumer can recall the names belonging to each number (hundreds), whereas it is easier to remember to additive that does not suit you.
• Special mention goes to imported products and that you sometimes see in the translation “forget” to include ingredients (additives) and simply put “flavors”. Luckily the food laws are becoming stricter in these cases.
• Ingredients should appear. This seems obvious because it is not under the law of each country is allowed to name certain ingredients if not exceed a certain percentage of final product weight. The problem, as we said before, is that people are so sensitive that with a paltry amount of certain ingredient rapidly and severely ill. For example, some sausages have some cereal in their composition and that can be serious for a celiac person.

As we see it is very important a correct labeling of product ingredients stating all ingredients in a simple language and citing at least the amount of the most prominent ingredient.

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