What in the world is carrageenan doing in heavy whipping cream?? When we buy “heavy whipping cream”, we expect that it contain only that – heavy whipping cream! Apparently, that’s just a fantasy in today’s food culture.
When the runt of Ava’s litter needed hand-feeding, we ran out to the local grocery store to buy the needed supplies. This was a store that offers “natural” and organic food, along with a heck of a lot of conventional food. Fortunately, goat milk was available (though not raw, of course). No organic heavy whipping cream was available, though several other conventional ones were.
We also routinely refill our water jugs with filtered water from this particular store (the ferments don’t like chlorinated water) and one day, while waiting for the bottles to fill, we were idly looking at fancy little plastic bottles of heavy whipping cream that were prominently placed for the holiday. What we weren’t expecting was to see carrageenan on the ingredient list. What??
Sadly, every single heavy whipping cream offering at this store contained carrageenan. We chose the one that listed it as the last ingredient, but were exasperated that we could not even buy heavy whipping cream that only contained heavy whipping cream. Unimaginable…but real. We also had a coupon for a brand of ice cream that has long had a reputation of good corporate citizenry and simple ingredients, and we grabbed a pint of our favorite. We were almost at the checkstand before we noticed…carrageenan! For crying out loud!! That pint went back in the store’s freezer and we bought a competitor’s brand, instead – without carrageenan.
Those of us who don’t wish to consume it are, irritatingly, forced to check each and every label to ensure it’s not there. Yeah, what a hassle…and that’s the reality of our food these days. Unless you made it, yourself, from scratch, check the ingredient list. Chances are, you’ll find something you won’t like in there (and it’s no wonder the kit didn’t want to drink the formula). Keep the carrageenan in seaweed and out of our heavy whipping cream!
For more more information on why you should avoid carrageenan, check out the Cornucopia Institute’s report, “Carrageenan: How a Natural Food Additive is Making Us Sick”: https://www.cornucopia.org/carrageenan-stories/.