Gelatin dessert
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One of the most popular gelatin products, gelatin dessert, or jelly as it is more commonly known, comes in many flavors. It is sometimes sold as a powder and sometimes in the form of loosely attached cubes, resembling a wobbly chocolate bar. Popular brands include Jell-OŽ from Kraft Foods in North America and Rowntree's Jelly in the United Kingdom.
Jell-O is the official state snack food of Utah, which is reported to have the highest per capita sales of green gelatin dessert of any US state.
Some gelatinous desserts can be made with agar instead of gelatin, allowing them to congeal quicker and at higher temperatures. This is used especially in quick jelly powder mix and Asian jelly deserts, but also for vegetarian alternatives.
Animal rendering is a key step in the manufacture of gelatin desserts. Hide trimmings are boiled in 70-foot vats to remove collagen, which is then soaked and filtered. Horns or hooves are not used, as is traditionally thought. The extract is then dried to form a powder, and is mixed with sugar, adipic acid, fumaric acid, disodium acid, sodium citrate, red dye 40, and artificial flavoring. The powder is shipped to Delaware and California for packaging and distribution to supermarkets.
In 1992 the gelatin industry, in particular Kraft's Atlantic Gelatin plant in Woburn, Massachusetts that supplies the vast majority of the nation's Jell-O, came under scrutiny for a history of noxious smells, toxic waste releases into Boston Harbor, and a policy of secrecy. Heading off a rash of local complaints, lobbyists invited Massachusetts state representatives Paul Casey and Carol Donovan into the plant. However, the representatives were barred from going past the conference room. Repeated requests for a plant tour by journalists were refused. In 1993 the plant was hit with a $250,000 fine for violating the Clean Air Act of 1970. In a February 4 1996 article, the Associated Press reported that a Massachusetts Department of Environmental Protection official was one of only a few outsiders who had seen the inside of the Woburn plant.
Due to the mad cow disease (BSE) and its link to the Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease, concerns have been raised by activists about the safety of gelatin.
See also
External link
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Capri Sun | Dairylea | General Foods | Jell-O | Kool-Aid | Kraft Dinner | Maxwell House | Oscar Mayer | Tang | Toblerone | Vegemite |
