Oh no!! This is sad news indeed. I should have known, since they don't taste at all 'natural', but still...A recent article in the NY Daily News writes:
"...researchers from the University Hospital Aachen, for instance, found that the pearls contained polychlorinated biphenyls or PCBs such as styrene, acetophenone, and brominated substances, chemicals that shouldn't be in food at all, researchers told German paper The Local."
Read the whole story here: http://www.nydailynews.com/life-style/health/tapioca-pearls-bubble-tea-carcinogens-polychlorinated-biphenyls-pcbs-article-1.1148110
I don't usually drink my milk tea with tapioca, and when other drinks come with it I ask for it without the pearls. You can make homemade bubble tea using the premade tapioca balls, but check the ingredients before you purchase them in the store. You can also substitute something healthier like nata de coco, which Argo uses in their bubble tea and it's quite delicious.
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| Argo's 'bubbles' |
I've never liked bubble tea, but this makes sense, especially if these are industrially-processed products.
ReplyDeleteThis concerns me a lot, too, given that this study was in Germany. Germany tends to have much higher standards for maintaining food safety than the US, so I think it is highly likely that if these carcinogens have been found in tapioca "bubbles" in Germany, they are probably at least as much of a problem in the US.