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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

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