I thought maybe this video was faked (especially when the "food artist" narrator said that he had "assumed iron...was a naturally occurring protein..."), but now I'm going to go look for a magnet.
In 1985 I was a summer engineering intrern at Ralson Purina, who owned the Chex cereal lines at that time. I spent almost two months in Battle Creek, MI (cereal capital of the world at that time, I think there was also a Kellogg and a General Mills plant there too). On my first days the junior Production Engineer gave me a tour of the cereal making process from start (receipt of the grains) to end (out of the ovens and into the packaged boxes). Into the beginning of the tour he stopped to pick up a sandwich size clear plastic bag off ark grey matter at the quality he told me it was iron. We went straight to the large cooking vats (over 6ft tall) and he dumped the entire contents into the cooking cereal mash. He told me it was mandated by the government to add iron. When I tell this story to people today I can see most are skeptical...
We dissolved cereal in water and extracted the iron filings in high school chemistry. The goal was to teach fine measurement (we used the analytical balance) and compute the percentage of iron (by weight) in the cereal. As a result I thought this was well known.
Mittle! I knew it!
ReplyDeleteIn 1985 I was a summer engineering intrern at Ralson Purina, who owned the Chex cereal lines at that time. I spent almost two months in Battle Creek, MI (cereal capital of the world at that time, I think there was also a Kellogg and a General Mills plant there too). On my first days the junior Production Engineer gave me a tour of the cereal making process from start (receipt of the grains) to end (out of the ovens and into the packaged boxes). Into the beginning of the tour he stopped to pick up a sandwich size clear plastic bag off ark grey matter at the quality he told me it was iron. We went straight to the large cooking vats (over 6ft tall) and he dumped the entire contents into the cooking cereal mash. He told me it was mandated by the government to add iron.
ReplyDeleteWhen I tell this story to people today I can see most are skeptical...
One wonders if this is even digestable in thos form...
ReplyDeleteThat was quick;
ReplyDeletehttps://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_iron_metabolism#Dietary_iron_uptake
To be absorbed, dietary iron can be absorbed as part of a protein such as heme protein or iron must be in its ferrous Fe2+
We dissolved cereal in water and extracted the iron filings in high school chemistry. The goal was to teach fine measurement (we used the analytical balance) and compute the percentage of iron (by weight) in the cereal. As a result I thought this was well known.
ReplyDelete