Comment by nozzlegear 3 days ago
As an oatmeal connoisseur, I'd be remiss not to point out that the two oatmeal products being compared there are not the same. The American product is specifically "Strawberries and Cream," which looks like it was deliberately picked because it adds a few extra scary-looking ingredients from the creaming agent; whereas the UK product is just "Heaps of Fruit," sans cream.
Here's the American version of "heaps of fruit," "fruit fusion."
https://www.walgreens.com/store/c/quaker-oats-instant-oatmea...
Ingredients
Whole grain oats,sugar,dried raspberries,dried strawberries,natural flavor,tricalcium phosphate,salt,beet juice concentrate (color),iron,vitamin D2 (ergocalciferol).
The American version is identical to the UK version until "natural flavor." The US version then adds some vitamins plus tricalcium phosphate, salt, and beet juice concentrate. The only "scary" ingredient is tricalcium phosphate, which appears to be an anti-caking agent.
Edit: on Quaker's website
https://www.quakeroats.com/products/hot-cereals/instant-oatm...
It says "Tricalcium Phosphate is a source of phosphorus that also provides the essential mineral calcium." Which is actually what I suspected, it's another added vitamin that has the benefit of also being an anti caking agent.
Why does our version need an anti-caking agent when theirs doesn't? And why do we need to get calcium from checks notes oat meal (the non-cream version, mind you) when people in other countries can get it from things it's in naturally, like milk?
There may be ostensible reasons why some of the extras we get are theoretically useful, but I'd still wonder why we're the only ones who go to all the trouble (when we don't seem to come out ahead for it, health-wise).
The UK versions all seem to have calcium phosphate in them too.
https://www.britishcornershop.co.uk/quaker-oat-so-simple-hea...
https://www.sainsburys.co.uk/gol-ui/product/quaker-oats-high...
For some reason, the quaker oats uk website doesn't list it though, perhaps they're new formulations.
I imagine it's used to keep the fine powders (powdered salt or milk powder depending on the product) from caking. If the previous version didn't have any salt, then it might not have needed it.
The UK product contains freeze dried strawberries and raspberries. The USA market "strawberries and cream" contains no strawberry, instead it has freeze dried apple dyed red with added strawberry flavor.
I don't believe natural is inherently good nor artificial inherently bad but the USA product is objectively lower quality. IMHO it is cheaply made crap to fool people that do not read the ingredients.