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At 11:11 PM -0500 12/31/06, Mary b wrote:
>Someone recently wrote to the list about Hersheys misleading
>everyone by not listing certain gluten containing additives to their
>candy . The list also referred to nestle crunch bars as being
>gluten free & always disclosing gluten additives properly. So I
>stopped & looked at the Nestle Crunch bars while shopping. The
>ingredient lists "barley malt" & therefore are not gluten free.
>Just goes to show us that we always need to question the mfr. about
>ingredients. maryb
I am responding to the group, rather than just MaryB, for fear that
the above might be in response to recent posts I made about companies
that disclose all gluten, and those that do not.
My intent is to clarify, because the above is a huge misunderstanding
of my postings! I hope that I was more clear than this would
indicate. Thus, I just want to completely clarify the nature of my
posts.
I listed a number of companies (and their individual brands) that
*DO* DISCLOSE ALL GLUTEN on their labels. This does NOT mean all
those companies' products are all gluten free! It just means that if
there is gluten of any kind (not just wheat), they are confident that
they have included information about those ingredients on their
labels. One of the companies I identified was Nestle. When there is
gluten in Nestle's products, they disclose it all on their
ingredients labels. One of the Nestle's brands listed was "Crunch."
That does not mean Nestle's Crunch is gluten free -- and I did NOT
state that Nestle's Crunch is GF! It means that Crunch, along with
all Nestle's brands, will list gluten if it is in the product. And,
as MaryB found out by reading the label, Nestle's Crunch contains
gluten and they list it as "barley malt."
I also listed some companies that *DO NOT* necessarily disclose all
gluten. One of those companies is Hershey's. I am QUITE sure I did
not state that Hershey's was "misleading." That is a total
misstatement of anything I wrote. They are not misleading -- but
they are now quite clear they are not able to list all gluten in
their products. If you call them (which, it would seem, is a wise
idea) and ask about a specific product, they MAY be able to tell you
if it is free of gluten ... or they MAY NOT. It depends on the
product. The reason for this stance, as I was told by a senior rep
at Hershey's, is that they do not require their own suppliers of
flavorings and ingredients to disclose gluten, other than wheat
(which is by law, of course). I happened to be calling about
Hershey's Kisses at the time -- a new "cherry cordial" flavor. The
rep reviewed the ingredients and told me the "cherry cordial" Kisses
contained some ingredients for which Hershey's did not have
information about gluten, and could not tell me if they did or didn't
have gluten. My choice was not to eat them, especially since I
called due to what I thought was a reaction to them.
Also, as a further footnote, those companies I listed that do not
necessarily disclose all gluten ... this also does NOT mean they
don't disclose ANY gluten! I imagine if they actually know, in many
cases, that a product might contain malt or barley malt, they will
include it on the label. But what they are saying is that, in some
cases, they do not guarantee to include gluten information other than
wheat, likely for a variety of reasons. From my conversations with
these companies, the typical reason is because they actually do not
know -- because their manufacturing policies do not require their own
suppliers to tell them if something includes gluten other than wheat.
Goodness, I hope this clarifies what could be a very health-costly
misinterpretation of the information I provided!
~ Suzanne
Visit the Celiac Web Page at Http://www.enabling.org/ia/celiac/index.html
Archives are at: Http://Listserv.icors.org/SCRIPTS/WA-ICORS.EXE?LIST=CELIAC
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