How Many Ingredients are in these Big Brand Tortillas?
And why there should only be four (or five).
When I came back from a two-week holiday and found an open packet of wheat flour tortillas in the cupboard that were seemingly still edible my suspicions were aroused.
Flipping over the packet I was aghast at the list of ingredients that confronted me. I knew they wouldn’t necessarily be the most wholesome product, but I had no idea that anyone could pack this many ingredients into a simple tortilla.
Ingredients in Mission Flour Tortillas:
Enriched Bleached Wheat Flour (Wheat Flour, Niacin, Reduced Iron, Thiamine Mononitrate, Riboflavin, Folic Acid), Water, Vegetable Shortening (Interesterified Soybean Oil, Hydrogenated Soybean Oil and/or Palm Oil), contains 2% or less of: Salt, Sugar, Leavening (Sodium Bicarbonate, Sodium Aluminum Sulfate, Corn Starch, Monocalcium Phosphate and/or Sodium Acid Pyrophosphate, Calcium Sulfate), Distilled Monoglycerides, Enzymes, Wheat Starch, Calcium Carbonate, Antioxidants (Tocopherols, Ascorbic Acid, Citric Acid), Cellulose Gum, Guar Gum, Dough Conditioners (Fumaric Acid, Sodium Metabisulfite and/or Mono- and Diglycerides), Calcium Propionate and Sorbic Acid (to preserve freshness)
Source: www.missionfoods.com
Are you Interesterified yet?
I am not a scientist so a lot of the words on the list of ingredients mean nothing to me. I was surprised to be introduced to a new verb though — interesterify. I thought, “Oh, bless the guys at Mission Foods — they want to make the soybean oil more interesterifying” and I guess in a way they were…
““Interesterification is a process that rearranges the fatty acids of a fat product…this process is typically used to adjust the physical characteristics of the fat, such as melting point and plasticity””
It is basically doing a similar job to hydrogenation but apparently, it’s preferable as “it better preserves the nutritional attributes of the food”.
Whatever.
Frankly, I don’t want to eat anything that has been hydrogenated or interesterified or to consume a shopping list of chemicals that have been added to make it taste “better” and last longer.
It’s a pity that these industrial pancakes are the only tortillas that many folks get to experience because a fresh flour (or corn) tortilla is a thing of great beauty.
I often make my own tortillas to fill with slow-cooked pork or homemade falafels and, by contrast, my ingredients list consists of only 4 items. You can make it 5 with a teaspoon of baking powder if you want a slightly fluffier end product.
Homemade Flour Tortilla Ingredients (makes about 10 large):
3 Cups of Flour
1 Cup of Warm Water
1/3 Cup of Extra Virgin Olive Oil
1 Tsp Salt +
1 Tsp Baking Powder (optional)
Method
Mix the flour and the salt (and the baking powder if using) in a bowl (I use a standing mixer with a dough hook but you can mix by hand) then slowly add the water and oil with the mixer on a medium speed (5 mins).
Once a ball is formed tip the dough onto a floured surface and knead for a couple of minutes until the dough feels nice and smooth.
Divide the dough into 10 equal pieces of between 60g and 65g (for an 8” to 9” wrap) and roll them into balls
Cover with a damp cloth and leave for 30 mins.
Heat a large cast iron saucepan on a medium/high heat.
Flour your surface and rolling pin and begin to roll out the dough balls. You really want to get them as thin as you can — roll out a few and hang them over the side of a bowl before you start cooking — this way you have a head start and can save time by cooking and rolling as you go.
Tip: If the dough is resistant to being stretched just leave it to relax for another couple of minutes and then resume rolling.
To cook just carefully lay the wraps onto the pan and when they start to bubble (less than 1 minute) flip them over for another 15–20 seconds before lifting them out and covering with a tea towel. The cooking and rolling process takes about 20 minutes.
Nutitional Info per wrap (approx 65g)
Carbohydrate 26.4g (Sugar 0.5g); Fibre 1.1; Fat 7.7g; Protein 4.3g; Kcal 189
Labour Intensive
It is probably unrealistic to suppose that a busy parent could knock these up for packed lunches every week but the beauty of bread is its simplicity and the simplicity of this recipe serves to highlight the absurdity of the industrial alternative.
When you read about the processes involved in making an industrial tortilla and scan the long list of ingredients it seems no wonder that we are facing a public health meltdown.
Shop About
But don’t despair — shop about! There are brands out there selling delicious wraps with sensible ingredients. Crosta & Mollica make a Piadina containing only flour, water, extra virgin olive oil and salt. I use these regularly now and when heated in a hot pan for a minute they go soft and delicious.
Cost is playing an ever more influential role in our purchasing decisions but don’t let that stop you from reading the labels. There are products out there which don’t cost the earth and don’t have a list of ingredients as long as your arm — they may not stay fresh for the duration of a nuclear winter but with a bit of organisation these chemically-induced, stay-soft, long-life abominations are really not necessary.
““Don’t eat anything with more than five ingredients, or ingredients you can’t pronounce.””
Sage advice. Oh yeah, I think the answer’s 16.
