Preserved eggs, also known as pine eggs or egg, can not only increase appetite, promote digestion and absorption of nutrients, but also cool, blood pressure and other effects, processed by lime, salt, edible alkali and so on. According to an industry insider in Nanchang, Jiangxi, many locally produced preserved eggs were marinated with industrial copper sulfate, only to shorten the curing time. Industrial copper sulphate contains toxic and harmful elements such as lead, arsenic and cadmium, which pose a great threat to human health.
1. Can copper sulfate be used to preserve preserved eggs?
According to relevant regulations, food grade must be used.
It is understood that food grade copper sulphate can be used as a chelating agent and clarifying agent in preserved egg and wine production processes. According to the relevant provisions of the Food Safety Law of the People’s Republic of China, copper sulphate is listed as a processing aid for the food industry to replace lead oxide for the processing of preserved eggs. According to the regulations, companies can use the food additive copper sulfate to pickle preserved eggs. This is also emphasized by the National Standard for Food Additives Copper Sulfate, which was implemented on January 25, 2013. It can be seen that copper sulphate is allowed to be used in preserved egg processing, but the food additive copper sulphate must be used instead of industrial copper sulphate.
The biggest difference between industrial copper sulfate and food additive copper sulfate is that industrial copper sulfate generally contains toxic and harmful elements such as lead, arsenic and cadmium. If used to process preserved eggs, it will cause harm to the human body. In addition to the cheap price of industrial copper sulphate, another reason is to use industrial copper sulphate to soak preserved eggs, which can shorten the production time of preserved eggs. It takes two months to process the preserved eggs. Using industrial copper sulphate, it takes only one month. “Baked out.”
2. Can you measure it using industrial grade?
Experts say it is difficult to detect which copper sulfate was used.
Liu Dong, the news and publicity department of the State Food and Drug Administration, told the media that as of June 13, no production license had been issued to any domestic enterprise to produce copper sulfate. However, the reporter found that “copper sulfate” is not uncommon in the results of the food additive production license issued by the quality supervision department. Enter “food grade copper sulfate” on the Internet to search, there are many sellers, claiming that they are selling food grade copper sulfate, some sellers also require 10 kg.
Relevant experts said that the identification of “lead, arsenic, cadmium” is currently a sampling test in the detection of preserved eggs, but even if the results of the sampling exceed the standard, it does not mean that the company used industrial copper sulfate during processing. In other words, it is difficult to determine which type of copper sulfate is used by the company and only from the preserved eggs. Therefore, industrial copper sulfate can only be used from the source of production.
In September 2008, China’s newly revised lead content standard for preserved eggs removed the traditional lead-containing processing technology in the original preserved egg standard. In 2010, according to the relevant provisions of the Food Safety Law of the People’s Republic of China, copper sulfate was included in the food industry. The use of processing aids to replace lead oxide, that is, companies can use the food additive copper sulfate to pickle preserved eggs, but the national food safety risk assessment center expert Wang Huan said: must use food additive grade copper sulfate for the processing of preserved eggs, industry Copper sulphate cannot be used to marinate preserved eggs.
It is understood that if industrial copper sulphate is used to soak preserved eggs, it is often the shorter the time of making preserved eggs. The more components of copper sulphate are added, the greater the harm to the human body. In order to gain profits, abuse industrial copper sulfate, and find ways to shorten the processing cycle of preserved eggs, enterprises have become an open secret in the industry. At present, there is no enterprise in China that has been approved to produce “food additive copper sulfate”.