• Question: what is the chemical used in foods to make them increase in size?

    Asked by lilneicey to Louise, Michaela, Steve on 24 Jun 2010 in Categories: .
    • Photo: Louise Johnson

      Louise Johnson answered on 24 Jun 2010:

      Lots of techniques are used by food producers to make foods bigger, at many different stages in food production. Food plants are larger than their wild relatives because of selective breeding, and because they’ve been grown in good soils with lots of fertilisers and pesticides. Animals for food are also bred for high meat yield, and are fed a diet designed to help them grow fast. It’s illegal in the EU to feed growth hormones to farm animals, but it happens elsewhere in the world.

      Also, some meat products are soaked with water and polyphosphates to help the water soak in. This can make meat juicier, but some customers object to paying for water!

    • Photo: Michaela Livingstone

      Michaela Livingstone answered on 24 Jun 2010:

      In the case of plants, they are given fertilizers containing Nitrogen (N), Phosphorous (P) and Potassium (K) which are essential nutrients needed by plants in order for them to grow big. In the case of animals, they are sometimes given hormones to make them grow bigger and have more meat. But it’s not legal to do that in every country.

    • Photo: Steven Kiddle

      Steven Kiddle answered on 24 Jun 2010:

      In many foods, such as bacon, that chemical is salt water. Some animals are fed steroids to bulk them up, although i believe this is illegal in the uk. Some plants are given fertilizer to make them grow bigger, but this is just good plant food basically.

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