citric acid : acidity regulator

pog it

Hey dudes, I've been doing my own little test of pasta sauces from jars and I noticed the cheaper one has in the list of ingredients something called 'acidity regulator: citric acid' whereas the other two I've tried are more expensive brands and didn't state that they contain this.

So folks, can I ask a silly question for some of you- why does this cheaper product need acidity regulator and is there a negative impact on your body from citric acid?

Cheers,

Sapsorrow

Hiya, citric acid is a natural chemical found in citrus fruits and the extracted and purified form is what is in your pasta sauce. My food chem's a bit rusty so I'm not sure which function it would perform in this case but it would either be related to creating a certain desired flavour, maybe a tangyness not naturally found in the product, or it may perform some preservative function (many food spoilage microbes can't thrive in an acidic environment). Either way at the end of the day it comes from plants and isn't harmfull in my opinion and I myself avoid artificaial preservatives, flavours etc..
As for it's being in one brand and not the other I would speculate that the expensive brands are targetting the more educated and wealthier classes and therefore like to keep their ingredients list to an absolute minumum if possible as this appeals to that market these days.
The cheaper brands however are targetting ppl on a budget who for socio-economic reasons are much less likely to care if the ingredients list is 100 words long or 5 words long.
Hope that helps!

memo_to_all

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