Nuclear Weapon-Proof? "Deconstructing the Twinkie"

[Matsubara]

http://www.thestar.com/sciencetech/article/203199

Deconstructing the Twinkie

No, it won't stay fresh forever, but some of its ingredients do come from mines.
Apr 15, 2007 02:30 AM
Patricia Hluchy
It has a name that many people can't utter without a smirk, yet half a billion of them are sold each year. The stuff of urban legend, pop-culture satire and even then-U.S. president Bill Clinton's Millennium Time Capsule, Twinkie is about as iconic as an American food can get.

Since its birth during the Depression, the gold-coloured cakelet has morphed from scrumptious symbol of American ingenuity to epitome of additive-laden junk. Rumour has it that the gold-coloured snack can last forever (in truth, the shelf life is about 25 days).

The belief that a Twinkie can survive a nuclear holocaust inspired an episode of the animated series The Family Guy, while an instalment last year of the comic strip Doonesbury joked that a year's supply of Twinkies are baked every February.

When New York City writer Steve Ettlinger set out several years ago to write a book about artificial ingredients in processed foods, Twinkie emerged as the perfect specimen.

"It's the quintessential processed food," says Ettlinger, author of Twinkie, Deconstructed (Hudson Street/Penguin). "And the ingredients in a Twinkie are found, I realized pretty early on, in most processed foods; they're in canned goods, they're in salad dressings, they're in ice cream, cookies."


What's in those things, anyway?
Below are the ingredients to which food specialist Steve Ettlinger devotes chapter-length examinations in his new book,

Twinkie, Deconstructed :

Polysorbate 60, wheat flour, bleach, enrichment blend (ferrous sulfate and B vitamins – niacin, thiamine mononitrate, (B1) riboflaven (B2), folic acid), sugar, corn sweeteners, corn syrup (dextrose, glucose, high-fructose corn syrup), corn thickeners (cornstarch, modified cornstarch, corn dextrins, corn flour), water, soy (partially hydrogenated vegetable and/or animal shortening, soy lecithin, and soy protein isolate), eggs, cellulose gum, whey, leavenings, baking soda, phosphates (sodium acid pyrophosphate and monocalcium phosphate), salt, mono and diglycerides, natural and artificial flavours, sodium stearoyl lactylate, sodium and calcium caseinate, calcium sulfate, sorbic acid, and last but not least, FD&C yellow no. 5 and red no. 40.

[Matsubara]

1. Even as a kid in the 70s I thought they were a bit gross...

But I loved Hostess cupcakes...

[LostinVA]

2. I just read that book -- GREAT read!