
Ingredients of an All-Natural Banana - joosters
http://jameskennedymonash.wordpress.com/2013/12/12/ingredients-of-an-all-natural-banana/
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mast
While interesting, I think these diagrams are dangerous. They send a message
that if fresh fruits contain these "scary" chemicals, then we shouldn't worry
about the chemicals we see in processed foods. The problem is that some
processed foods really do contain chemicals we should be afraid of. Artificial
colours or things like calcium disodium EDTA are good examples.

My part time project has been to try and provide some simple to understand
descriptions of the "scary" chemicals at
[http://foodconstrued.com](http://foodconstrued.com)

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bjackman
This is fantastic! I don't eat meat, and out of laziness I often get my
protein from Quorn, which is a brand of Mycoprotein. People often say "but
it's synthetic! It's made in vats!". This is true. So what?

I was having this debate with someone and we had a look at the ingredients. My
opponent pointed triumphantly at "rehydrated corn starch" (i.e. flour and
water). "See, it's processed!", she said.

I wish we could get away from the idea that Stainless Steel Bad, Wood and
Leather Good. I suspect a lot of people would be horrified to see the shiny
metallic interior of that temple of Natural Goodness the Innocent Smoothie
factory!

ps: "out of laziness" \- not because there's anything wrong with Quorn as a
source of nutrients; it's just a pretty boring way to cook and eat!

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Blahah
To be pedantic, Quorn is not synthetic. It's made by intensive farming of
fungi, not by pure abiotic chemical synthesis. But I agree with all your
points :)

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victorhooi
You know what, I'm not a vegetarian - but that Quorn stuff looks interesting.

Low-fat, high protein - and it's mushrooms! (I like mushrooms...haha).

I might see if it's available here in Australia - how do you find the taste?
And do you use it as a major component in your diet?

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bjackman
It doesn't really have any flavour of its own (similarly to Tofu), but it's
normally sold "chicken-style" or "beef-style", and has some sort of very mild
flavouring added.

One form it comes in is frozen "mince". That would probably be the best way
for a non-veggie to eat it. You can use it as a replacement for beef in
pies/chili con carne/bolognese etc. The lack of fat probably makes it slightly
less satisfying but I'd say it's worth it for the health benefits. The actual
flavour doesn't suffer at all.

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cing
The author seems to be putting quite a bit of time into making these by hand.
I wonder if it's possible to auto-generate these diagram/infographics for
arbitrary food items and ingredient lists using nutritiondata.com and chemical
databases.

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aroch
Yes/No; you'd need to do extractions[1] and GC-MS[2] at the very least to get
the possible compound list. Plant / animal tissue is fairly complex, and while
we can guesstimate compounds and relative percentages there are some obvious
issues with this if we want to use them as canon.

[1]:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liquid%E2%80%93liquid_extracti...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liquid%E2%80%93liquid_extraction)

[2]:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gas_chromatography%E2%80%93mas...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gas_chromatography%E2%80%93mass_spectrometry)

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Blahah
This has already been done, and is contained in the USDA nutrient database
([http://ndb.nal.usda.gov/](http://ndb.nal.usda.gov/)), among others.

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innguest
I'm an absolute layman when it comes to this subject, so forgive my verbosity
and lack of proper terminology:

When I clicked on that link and searched for "banana" and then clicked on
"banana, raw", I was hoping to see a list of the scary-looking names I saw on
the blog post that started this thread. I only see things I recognize.

I think what would be cool/interesting (and I'm guessing what cing meant to
say) would be if there were a way to get that list (the scary-looking one, not
the vitamins and minerals one) from some procedure done to a vegetable.

In that sense, the link you provided does not have the same information that
the author of the blog post is (apparently) compiling by hand.

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throwaway_yy2Di
_" I think what would be cool/interesting (and I'm guessing what cing meant to
say) would be if there were a way to get that list (the scary-looking one, not
the vitamins and minerals one) from some procedure done to a vegetable._'

It is currently not possible:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metabolomics#Metabolome](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metabolomics#Metabolome)

Found some papers on Google that try to find fractions of the metabolome -- in
this one, the tomato:

[http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1533921/](http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1533921/)

    
    
       The identification of compounds, in particular secondary
       metabolites, through a metabolomic profiling approach
       encounters some major difficulties. First, the number of
       commercially available standards of secondary metabolites
       reported to be present in a specific plant species or
       tissue is low. Second, in an automated online separation,
       PDA detection, MS measurement, and/or MS/MS fragmentation
       of mass signals, it is difficult to meet optimized levels
       for all eluting compounds. Due to overlapping compounds,
       low intensity mass signals, or difficulties in the
       isolation of the mass signal for MS/MS fragmentation,
       the extraction of usable information for identification
       purposes can be complicated. Third, the lack of dedicated
       software and databases that integrate spectroscopic and
       MS data limits the identification procedure to a manual
       level. Nevertheless, by these means 43 metabolites could be
       readily assigned in the tomato fruit extract (Tables III
       and IV), leaving more to be identified. The total number
       of compounds detectable by our LC-MS system is difficult
       to calculate due to the presence of mass signals from
       isotopes, adducts, and unintended in-source fragmentation.

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asdfs
What's the opposition to MSG? I was under the impression that it was fine,
though that there was a possibility that some people have adverse reactions to
it — but if you're not one of those people, it's nothing to be concerned
about.

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ye
That's not an all-natural banana.

Here's what natural bananas look like:

[http://cdnimg.visualizeus.com/thumbs/dc/2e/artificial_select...](http://cdnimg.visualizeus.com/thumbs/dc/2e/artificial_selection,banana,domestication,food,humans,natural-
dc2e804177daa25fba41c856b53cadf2_h.jpg)

What you buy in the store is genetically modified (through selection mainly).

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aroch
What exactly is not natural about human-caused selection? As far as the banana
is concerned, we're a "predator" that increasingly preys on banana plants
which produce fewer seeds but bigger, sweeter ovary. It's a directed, inverse
selection pressure. There is nothing "not natural" about human-directed
selection for agriculture.

~~~
ye
> _What exactly is not natural about human-caused selection?_

It's, by definition, artificial selection.

With your "logic" everything is natural.

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hughlomas
A name is not a definition. Artificial selection is a subset of natural
selection. Humans are natural components of the environment for the thing
being selected.

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TheZenPsycho
With no definition for "Not natural", you render the word "Natural"
essentially meaningless- turning it into a "valid" adjective encompassing
everything.

Which, for reasons that should be obvious, makes it problematic as a word for
promoting certain types of food. Since humans are components of the ecosystem,
twinkies are technically "natural", right?

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hughlomas
"Natural" has more than one definition, dependent on its context. In some
definitions of the word "natural", yes, twinkies are technically natural. In
the more colloquial senses they are not. I prefer the more technical sense:
since humans are derived from nature, they are natural, hence anything they do
is natural. Unless you subscribe to some sort of man/nature metaphysical
duality I don't see how you can argue that humans are not natural.

Twinkies are made from the same atoms as everything else. A glucose molecule
assembled by a hypothetical atom arranger is indistinguishable from one
synthesized in an organism. Twinkies are ultimately derived from nature, just
as humans are ultimately derived from nature. Twinkies are a result of the
congruence of multiple ideas that have evolved by natural selection. Among
others, the ideas of refining and processing the chemical products of plants
and animals, and how to make a twinkie-like baked good. Twinkies did not
spontaneously appear in a vacuum.

Regardless of the words we use, the core idea of what we term "artificial
selection" is a subset of the core idea of what we term "natural selection".

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TheZenPsycho
but the context is food labelling, not technical/philisophical argument!

Let's address THAT definition of "Natural" without getting sidetracked by
irrelevancies.

