Secret Ingredient No. 4

...to be continued...

When olives were announced on Paper Chef #8, it was decided to use oriental olives as a variation to the Mediterranean ones to create a fusion dish. Several oriental shop (8 in total) were visited for salted black Chinese olives used for Thai style cooking in addition to sourcing
the fruit duped the Malay Olive from childhood memories. There was some vague recollection about a very tart mango tasting fruit, with hairy cores which according to childhood forklore, floated across the oceans between continents before planting themselves on land. This fruit is possibly the "hog plum" or the "makok" found during the shopping adventure. Below is the tasting report for a range of oriental olives to gauge their suitability for cooking.

Label: Dried Olive
Location: Singapore
Description: Sweet preserved olives, yellow coloured
Ingredients: Olive, sugar, salt, liquorice, citric acid, sodium benzoate, permitted food colour.
Comments: No additives mentioned on the Australian importer's label which hid the manufacturer's description. It is suspected the yellow is due to tartrazine, FD&C yellow No.5 or food code 102, which when used in conjction with benzoic acid (210), from the sodium benzoate (211), causes hyperactivity in children.
Taste:
Cooking: Eat as a snack or use in salad, in place of mangoes, melons or pears



Label: Preserved Thai olives with chilli
Location: Thailand
Description: Thai sweet sour hot olives with a little gel.
Ingredients: Thai olives 85%, Salt 1.9%, Sugar 2%, Chilli 1%, Water 10%, Liquorice extract 5.05%, Sodium Benzoate 0.05%



Label: Preserved Olive, no saccharine
Location: Taiwan
Description: Hot sweet preserved olive, red coloured
Ingredients: olive, salt, sugar, food additive: licorice, FD&C red #3, FD&C yellow #6, benzoic acid (preservative), hot pepper



Label: Makok sweet & sour with chilli
Location: Thailand
Description: Green hog plums, or makok in Thai in a vinegrette
Ingredients: Makok 85%, water 10%, sugar 2%, salt 1.85%, chilli 1%, citric acid 0.05%, liquorice extract 0.05 %, sodium benzoate 0.05%.
Comment: Suspicion of a blue green colourant on inspection of the green "chilli" specks staining the fruit. The bright green does not look natural.



Makok Seed


Label: Clove olives
Location: China
Description: dried olives wrapped in paper and plastic like clusters of peanuts. Brown coloured.
Ingredients: Olive, sugar, salt
Comment: No mentioned of clove in the ingredient list to explain the aroma



Label: Shantou Olives
Location: China, from Shantou
Description: Preserved black Chinese olives in brine
Ingredients: olive, salt.
Comment: Strongly suspect the tough leathery texture required preservatives not listed on the label.

Label: Preserved olive vegetable
Location: China
Description: Fermented salted black olives with mustard vegetables in oil
Ingredients: Mustard, rapeseed oil, olive, salt, monosodium glutamate



The Thai origin olives were well labelled unlike the ones from Singapore where there were discrepancies between the labels provided by the Australian distributor and the manufacturer. The Australian labels failed to list the preservatives and did not provide food codes like "621" for monosodium glutamate (MSG), or "127" for FD& C red #3, also known as erythrosine, which is used in maraschino (cocktail) and glacé cherries. The iodine content of erythrosine can cause hyperthyroidism in susceptible individuals, especially those with family history of thyroid conditions.

MSG has been blamed for all sort of symptoms after eating Chinese foods, although the effects are very small for the large population that use MSG. For the the individual who suffer the headaches, stomach cramps and hives, it is a different matter. Experts claim the effects are not reproducible in laboratories, and individuals experience problems only after very high dosages.

Liquorice can cause suppression of potassium (K) for susceptible individuals with thyroid conditions. K depletion causes muscle weakness, and in the worst case scenario, temporary paralysis requiring K transfusion in hospital. There are reports of paralysis triggered by ingestion of carbohydrates like in chocolate cake. The effect is more prevalent to people on Asian diets. For people without medical conditions, then this is a very rare effect and comes about only after excessive consumption beyond snacking, like several kilograms of liquorice sweets and drinking many cups of liquorice flavoured tea.

For FD&C yellow #6 also known as "sunset yellow" like the other colours mentioned can cause hyperactivity and as one website pointed out: "Animals studies show increased adrenal gland tumours, chromosomal damage, allergic reactions. Banned in Norway and Sweden."

The initial olive tasting "yum yum" suddenly turned into "yuk, gulp" with stomach churning. Oriental olives should be stored out of reach of young children because of potential choking on the large seeds with sharp double pointed ends, as well as undesirable side effects on susceptible individuals. Although this website is of a creative writing nature, be wary of excessive consumption of preservatives and colouring agents mentioned above which are used in a large range of foods, not just oriental olives.

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