Article Contributed on: 4/23/2007 11:51:59 AM
Yes - My wife really made me do this. We're attempting to document our progress in creating a more holistic, healthy lifestyle for our family. What better way than to put it in print and share it publicly? So, here's my first blog. Get ready to find out what's so special about California!
Ever since my wife and I began researching the ingredients of food served at restaurants, we find ourselves in our own kitchen quite a bit more. Take for example the trials and tribulations of ordering a pizza. Seems simple enough. We were ordering Papa Murphy's for several months until we finally looked up the ingredients online and discovered that they have Potassium Bromate in their pizza dough.
We, of course, had no idea what Potassium Bromate was but we saw a "red flag" in the original pizza dough ingredient list which goes like this ...I quote... (note bold print!)
"Enriched Wheat Flour (Wheat Flour, Malted Barley Flour, Niacin, Ferrous Sulfate, Thiamine Mononitrate, Riboflavin, Folic Acid), Water, Soybean Oil, Sugar, Salt, Sodium Bicarbonate, Inactive Dried Yeast, Sodium Aluminum Phosphate, Instant Yeast, Contains Less than 2% of Calcium Sulfate, Potassium Bromate, Tricalcium Phosphate, Magnesium Carbonate (
in the State of California, Potassium Iodate is used in place of Potassium Bromate. Calcium Sulfate, Tricalcium Phosphate, and Magnesium Carbonate are omitted)."
I have not researched all the ingredients - but if you notice Potassium Bromate is not used in California. WHY??? What's so special about California? So..I googled Potassium Bromate and discovered that it is considered a cancer threat. Why does California not have to deal with Potassium Bromate? Here's a link at
CSPI for more info. on this dangerous ingredient.
It appears that in 1991 California deemed bromate a carcinogen and banned it. Obviously Colorado has some catching up to do. In California, baked goods that contain more than a certain level of bromate in their items must declare a cancer warning on the label. How scary is that? I have no idea what the "certain level" is and I have decided that any amount is too much for me. Now I am wondering what other baked goods have bromates in them.
Check out our pizza pic - homemade crust...not too shabby!!! Oh yes..and good for you California!