Sparkling Ice: New trend, Old tricks
This is a good new trend – to satisfy consumer’s demand for healthy foods and soft drinks. Indeed, it looks like the CSPI‘s Food Day Message Reaches Millions! Here is another “ZERO calories” beverage with a vitamin composition similar to the recently reviewed Propel ZERO. But the old trick is an artificial food colorant, FD&C Red #40, added in the amount of about ~ 50 mg into every bottle of the Sparkling Ice. According to the Feingold Association even 20 mg of an artificial colorant may trigger severe ADHD, allergy or asthma reactions in sensitive children or adults. Please watch this nice video: Change Behavior By Changing Your Grocery List.
DyeDiet Doesn’t Buy It!
Sparkling Ice Blackberry: Risk, Nutrition and Dye Content
Stated value: Zero Calories Black Raspberry, Naturally Flavored Sparkling Mountain Spring Water; With Essential Vitamins and Antioxidants. Contains 3% juice.
True value: The value claims are correct. At least the manufacturer, Talkingrain Beverage Company does not lie to us. But it does not make a big sense to use mountain spring water if you deliberately contaminate it with a chlorinated hydrocarbon, sucralose, potentially toxic sodium benzoate and an azo-dye, Red 40. So do not be misled; red color of the beverage comes from 47 mg of Red #40 per bottle, not from the berries.
For ZERO calorie you will take bad risk associated with the foreign chemicals DDFI = 23/18 ~ 1.3 and you get low nutritional value of DDNF = 18/31 ~ 0.6 despite a bunch of vitamins and antioxidants added.
- Sucralose is an artificial sweetener, chlorinated sugar. Recent studies in man volunteers revealed that sucralose was excreted unchanged to some 97% within five days. While sucralose is recognized as “safe” not only by the FDA but also by the Center for Science in the Public Interest the DyeDiet disagrees on the general basis that, chemically, sucralose is still a chlorinated hydrocarbon that is completely foreign to human metabolism. Chlorinated nutrients are common for marine organisms like sponges, sea-weeds etc. but not for land mammals! Many chlorinated compounds are insecticidal and, most insecticides are known to be harmful for humans too. See an opinion about sucralose: Dangerous Sugar Substitute. Recently sucralose has been listed among 3 worst sweeteners. Available data indicate that sucralose indeed has low acute toxicity; oral rat LD50 ~ >10 g/kg; oral mouse LD 50 ~ >16 g/kg (see Section 11 of MSDS). OK with that! But who can swear to the public that regular consumption of sucralose for long years is safe? For instance, it was recently found that “Splenda” consumption in rats during the 12-week studies significantly lowered beneficial intestinal bacterial flora when pathogenic entero-bacteria were not affected I realize that diabetic people may have no choice unless they want to try Stevia or other natural sugar substitutes instead. Also please read an article A Role for Sweet Taste: Calorie Predictive Relations in Energy Regulation .
- Potassium benzoate, a food preservative with low acute toxicity in rats (LD50 ~ 4g/Kg, see Potassium Benzoate MSDS). However, in acidic medium (like in your stomach) it may produce highly toxic benzene, that is known, to cause cancers and reproductive damage (see Benzene MSDS, section 11).
- Red #40 (Allura red) chemically belongs to azo-dyes which are mild oxidants, may produce radicals and therefore may damage DNA. Please read CSPI Diet, ADHD and Behavior and Food Dyes: A Rainbow of Risks reports. You need Adobe Acrobat Reader to read it. Also take a look at this article: Dyes Matabolized to Benzidine.
A better choice: Mineral water!
DyeDiet RECOMMENDED
ZERO Calories S. PELLEGRINO Sparkling Natural Mineral Water
This mineral water you can find at your local Walmart store for $1.50 a bottle. Without issues associated with sucralose, artificial colorants and preservatives this is superior thirst quencher. Make less risky food choices and hydrate yourself right!
Category: Food Dyes Exposure, Soft drinks, Zero calories
Subscribe
If you enjoyed this article, subscribe to receive more just like it.
Hmm it looks like your blog ate my first comment (it was super long) so I guess I’ll just sum it up what I submitted and say, I’m thoroughly
enjoying your blog. I as well am an aspiring blog writer but I’m still new to everything. Do you have any recommendations for inexperienced blog writers? I’d
definitely appreciate it.
Sparkling Ice is now sold at Costco and that’s where I purchased it.
I read this article afterwards and send a message to Talking Rain to request that they take out the artificial dyes and replace it with something completely natural.
I thought the idea for the drink was fun but the ingredient list has since turned me off.
Is there any Sparkling Water with natural coloring that you know of?
Well, first what comes to my mind is IZZE Fortified http://www.dyediet.com/2012/09/22/soft-drinks/welcome-izze-fortified/ you can buy at Walmart. Second, Sparkling Concord Grape is a good beverage too http://www.dyediet.com/2012/10/20/soft-drinks/sparkling-concord-grape-is-a-good-drink/ , check it out. I like Perrier mineral water, naturally flavored. Look into http://www.perrier.com/en/index.html but I am not sure if they do produce any colored versions. Perhaps not.
My daughter had a huge allergic reaction to the Sparkling Ice Orange drink. I checked out the ingredients and concluded it was either the Maltodextrin or the dye. She is a Celiac, but also has dye allergies. Thanks for the article, it’s very informative!
I loved Sparkling Ice – it helped me quit drinking Coca Cola. It was a godsend. I noticed, however, that after drinking the black raspberry one, that my bowel movements were red! I asked my doctor about this on a routine visit and that I suspected it was the dye in that drink. She said I was probably allergic to it. I’m not so sure I am allergic to it – but am possibly – but there’s so much dye in it that I am sure your body just cannot handle that much dye! I ordered Talking Rain’s Sparkling Mountain Spring Water which has no dyes, sweeteners, etc… but it’s AWFUL. TERRIBLE. It tastes like Seltzer water – nothing else. Even the flavored ones in it taste awful. I guess I’ll stick to water and iced tea.
Thank you for sharing your experience! I like your final decision.
I will no longer expose myself or my family to their bright red toxic waste drink sold as Black Raspberry Sparkling Ice, and I will be sure to check the labels of other products that contain the same Red Dye #40.
Mineral Water is what rich people drink, I would know, I am first class.
I am fairly positive that I just had an allergic reaction to the Cherry Limeade flavor. My lips started tingling the second the bottle hit my mouth, and within the hour, my lips were swollen and inflamed. I messaged Sparkling Ice on Facebook, and they asked me to call or email their customer service, I sent an email and haven’t heard back. It’s pretty alarming that a product being sold as water can cause that kind of reaction in someone.