Episode 7 Rip Off Britain: Food

There is a lot we don't know about the food on our plates

and the shops and the labels don't always tell you the whole story.

The packaging, I think, is very misleading and it can give people

the impression they're getting more than there actually getting.

Whether you're staying in or going out, you've told us you can

feel ripped off by the promises made from what you eat

and what you pay for it.

I always say, when I get to the till and they tell me,

"Never! It can't... How much?"

From claims that don't stack up to the secrets behind the packaging,

we uncover the truth about Britain's food so that you can be sure

you are getting what you expect at the right price.

Your food, your money. This is Rip-Off Britain.

Hello and thanks for joining us

right here in the very heart of the Rip-Off Britain office where

today we're going to get stuck into what I'm pretty

sure for a lot of us has to be one of the most important issues

when it comes to our food and that is what exactly is in it

and how much can we actually rely on what it says on the label?

But, you know, you would hope that all the information you would

need would be crystal clear on the packaging

but, as you well know, sometimes that is definitely not the case

so we've peeled back the labels of some of the country's

biggest brands and best known products and I have to tell you

we have made some surprising discoveries

about what's actually inside,

including a few extra ingredients you might not expect at all.

But that's just for starters because were also going to be

exposing the way that some products actually don't contain any

of the food that you would expect them to

and we'll be revealing how it is that companies can get away

with selling something that may not be quite what you think.

Coming up, the labelling system that could help you make healthier

choices, so why have some of our biggest food companies not signed up?

You have to read the details at the back

and you don't always have time to do it.

And they all use different systems, which adds to the confusion

so, yeah, it could be clearer.

And heard the one about the beef product containing no beef?

You might be surprised by some of the ingredients

missing from some of the well-known products in your cupboards.

They just make it more difficult for you, don't they, all the time?

You know, they must think we're stupid.

Now, when I start to talk about this type of food, I want to go,

"Get me out of here!"

But normally we think that foods like crushed insects and the like

are absolutely reserved from those celebrities trapped in the jungle.

But now the viewer we are about to meet contacted us,

furious about what she found in a lemon dessert and,

subsequently, we've been discovering that can be a whole host

of unexpected ingredients in some of the products we buy all the time.

Lisa Jolly loves exploring

and finding strange things in unusual places.

If you want to come through, I'll show you a bit more of this tunnel.

Which makes volunteering as a tour guide

and excavator at the Liverpool's underground hidden gem

the Williamson Tunnels perfect for her.

The recently discovered passages are full of odd things which have

been dumped there by the Victorians.

These were all after Williamson's time.

Williamson died in 1840 and, when he died, the work on the tunnels

stopped because there was nobody to pay the men

and that's when the rubbish and the rubble started to be thrown in.

If you'd like to follow me. Mind your feet again.

But, much to her frustration, under the streets of Liverpool isn't the

only unusual place Lisa has been finding unexpected things of late.

As a vegetarian, she's very careful about what

she puts in her shopping basket.

When we moved to northern Shropshire, surrounded by fields and there's

sheep and cows in the field and the young lambs would be born and,

"Oh, I've got to eat them now," and I just... I can't do it any more.

I just... I just stopped.

Good lad. Come on.

And, these days, making sure that your dinner is meat-free is

a lot easier for busy shoppers than it used to be.

Or so you would think.

I bought one of these meal deals.

You get a main course, vegetables and dessert for £6, I think it was

and then he was restocking the shelf

and he came along with some lemon puddings. Just what I wanted.

I was in a hurry, took the lemon pudding, came home.

So far, so good.

But the back of the packet was to reveal an unfortunate surprise.

It wasn't till I got home that I read the back

and it had got beef gelatine in it.

I couldn't eat it.

Gelatine is a setting agent commonly used to thicken

and stabilise desserts but vegetarians avoid it

because it's made from the boiled bones and skin of animals.

So, for Lisa, it was no good at all.

Now, you don't have to be a vegetarian to be surprised

by some of the things that make it into your food

and, you know, the closer you look at the small print on the labels,

the more surprised you're likely to be.

'Now, how about insects?

'Well, that's the surprising ingredient

'in these treats that we tried to tempt some London shoppers with.

'And it's in plenty more foods that you may have eaten yourself.'

-Does it taste nice? Yeah?

-Why? What's in it?

Are you going to freak us out?

That looks like cream.

-Some form of cream.

-Yes.

-Maybe, I don't know, it looks...

A flower of some sort. But there's...

Are there colouring agents in there or is it natural?

-Where do you think the colouring comes from?

-Is it, like, beetles?

You're right. Good for you.

It's actually cochineal so it's crushed beetles.

Do you know what cochineal is made of?

Well, from the word, it sounds as if it's something red.

-So is it a beetroot or...?

-It's actually crushed beetles.

-Oh, God.

Horrible. I'm glad I didn't eat.

You heard right.

The food colouring agent cochineal is made from beetles,

which gives it its distinctive colour.

'It's common in confectionery, desserts and processed meat

'and there's a surprise ingredient in these jellybeans as well.'

Have one of those.

That's divine.

What do you think it might be in and around the jellybean?

-No?

-Well, it's the outer covering of the jellybean.

-It's a thing called shellac.

-What's that?

-Do you know where shellac comes from?

-No.

-It comes from the secretion of all those critters.

-Nice.

Nice(!)

Shellac, sometimes known as confectioners' glaze,

is what makes the beans shiny but what you may not know is that

it's made from a substance that oozes out of a bug's skin.

It's not just the icky by-products of the animal kingdom

we can expect to find popping up in our food and drink.

There may sometimes be more familiar ingredients, used,

though, in a thoroughly unexpected way, creating combinations

of foodstuffs that we might never have thought of mixing ourselves.

For example, milk in your wine, anyone?

Well, it turns out that is exactly what you might

find in many of the bottles we buy all the time.

'Now, it's something that I'd never heard of until

'I headed into the lab with our food science expert, Dr Peter Maynard.'

So, what happens in here, then, Peter, with the wine?

This is Sandra. She's testing these wines

for things that you might not expect to find in wine.

-Apart from wine.

-Apart from grapes, which would expect to find in wine.

But you wouldn't, perhaps, expect to find any milk in wine, would you?

-Seriously?

-Oh, yes, seriously. Yeah.

-And why would they put milk in wine?

Well, it's the milk protein which helps to make the wine clear.

If you add it, everything just coagulates and falls to the bottom

and you can then filter it off and you're left with a nice clear

wine, which is what consumers want.

They don't want a hazy wine, of course.

Wine can also be clarified by using egg,

so, as there's a chance that traces can remain in the finished product,

that, too, is often listed in the ingredients.

And what is Sandra checking out on the screen?

She's checking to see if there's any milk remaining in the wine.

There shouldn't be.

It should all disappear during the processing but, because milk is

an allergen to some people, it has to actually be declared on the label.

So, in future when I have wine, I'll just say,

"I'm just having egg and milk, really."

THEY LAUGH

Well, hopefully, there's very little left.

So, what has Sandra discovered here?

Well, she's testing these three wines and, from the actual results,

we can see that none of them

actually contain a detectable amount of milk.

Even though it might say it on the label.

It has been used in the process

but it's been lost during the process as well.

This may all seem like a bit of fun but there is a very serious

side to finding unexpected things in your food - allergic reactions.

Which is why manufacturers of pre-packed foods have to

state on the label

if their products contain one of 14 foods that can trigger

allergies and why many of them

choose to err on the side of caution

and add a warning even if allergens may only possibly be found.

It's only in the last year or so

that they actually had to be labelled as containing...

-possibly containing milk or egg.

-Is that because of allergy factor?

Because of the allergen.

Some people are much more allergic than others so,

although we've determined that there is no milk left in here, some people

might react if there was even one part per million of milk in there.

Other people who are sensitive to milk

would not react at that low level.

So it's very difficult to actually say,

"There is so much here, therefore it must be labelled,"

so, in fact, you have to say it to all the bottles.

If it's been treated with milk, you must declare that process.

'It's the fact that even tiny, tiny traces of particular foods

'can cause allergic reactions

'which makes it so vital for us to know exactly what we are consuming

'and so crucial that labelling is clear to prevent anyone

'eating or drinking a particular ingredient in a product

'they never dreamt would contain it.'

Later in the programme, we'll be hearing just how serious

finding something unexpected in your food can be.

I would actually be really struggling for breath

and feeling very dizzy and sometimes I would vomit.

If you're trying to make sure that you're eating healthily and want

to know exactly what's in your food, how easy is it for you to find out?

Now, you might think that all you need to do is take a quick

look at the label but it's really never been quite as straightforward

as that because there's never been a consistent approach by retailers and

manufacturers about the way in which they present their information.

But, in theory, all of that has changed

because a new colour-coded system of labelling has now been introduced,

the idea being that, pretty much at a glance, you can now easily

spot the nutritional content of the food that you are buying

and, just as importantly, instantly understand what that means.

The trouble is some of the biggest names in the food

business are refusing to play ball. So what does that mean for you

if you are keen to make the right choices?

With obesity at an all-time high

and the related health problems costing the NHS

more than £5 billion a year, it's a no-brainer that most of us

will want to think about what effects the things that we

put in our supermarket basket are going to have on our health.

But to do that and to make informed choices,

we need hard facts about what is in our food...

..which is where labels come in.

But when we're doing our weekly supermarket sweep,

we don't want to spend ages trying to figure out what they mean.

Isabelle Szmigin is an expert in how consumers behave.

When we go into the supermarket, when we are doing our shopping,

most of us have got a very small amount of time.

Some of us have got small children with us

so we're making very quick decisions.

In fact, it's estimated that we typically spend under

a second looking at the food packaging before deciding

whether to pop it in the basket or put it back on the shelf.

But, up to now, there's been no uniform system

for how nutritional information

is displayed on food labels that actually help us make up our minds.

So, while you're strolling down the supermarket aisles

doing your shopping, it means you've got to take in a whole

load of facts and figures that are presented in a variety of ways.

So, for instance, you may be trying to work out how many calories there

are in something or whether or not the levels of sugar, salt,

saturated fats are too high.

It really is quite difficult to make sense of it all.

If I'm picking up something, looking at it, the front and the back

and so on, and I don't know where to find it, it's going to take me

longer and possibly I'm not even going to look at that information

so we need something that is clear and you can immediately see it.

To find out just how easy it is to decipher the details on the packet,

we've taken to the streets, armed with three pepperoni pizzas

and the nutritional labels that we found on the supermarket packaging.

Each of them displayed their nutritional stats in different ways.

This one displays the information on the front of the pack.

It shows the percentage of your guideline daily intake

of sugar, fat, saturates and salt

and uses a colour-coded traffic light system to show

whether those amounts are healthy.

The next has the nutritional information listed under

the ingredients on the back of the pack but doesn't make clear

whether the amounts are particularly high or low.

And the third one displays the percentage per serving of an adult's

guideline daily amount but doesn't explicitly highlight,

through colour or words,

whether the levels of sugar, fat, saturates or salt are high.

So, which style label do shoppers find easiest to understand?

We asked them to stick one of our flags in the pizza

which they thought had the clearest label.

I like that cos I'm thinking it's the traffic light system

so red is really bad, amber not so bad.

I think I prefer that one.

It's got to be as easy to read as possible.

I think having it on the back is a really bad idea.

Oh, no, that's not good, is it?

You don't want to be turning the pizza upside down.

But I like the labelling on that one.

I'd say this one. It's per half pizza

so, I suppose, obviously, it's easier math to do.

From our highly unscientific experiment,

it seems that the information on the traffic light style

of labelling that you find the easiest to digest.

But perhaps that shouldn't be a surprise.

It's long been the method for which many of the industry

have been pushing.

And that's because it's so simple to understand.

Low levels of, say, salt or fat are labelled green to

suggest that they're healthy while higher levels are marked in red.

Using the traffic light system, we've got a really clear short cut.

I know what green means, I know what red means.

And if I see something like this that's got, you know,

the majority of red, I'm making an assessment fairly quickly.

I don't have to, you know, look all over

the back of the packet for various information.

I don't necessarily have to work out,

"Well, how much does this mean by 100g or how much would a portion be?"

And the Government agrees and, in 2012, introduced a design for

a consistent front-of-pack labelling using the traffic lights system.

It's designed to make it easier for us to make healthy choices

by highlighting when levels are particularly high.

The trouble is that some of the biggest names in the food

business are simply refusing to use what is a voluntary scheme.

They will not put the traffic light labelling on their products

and that means that, as a consumer,

you are going to continue to be faced with a rather bewildering

choice of very hard to compare labels every time you go shopping.

Amongst the companies who haven't yet signed up are Coca-Cola,

the biggest soft drinks company in the world.

Kellogg's, Heinz and Birds Eye have also said no to the scheme.

As has Mondelez International, the snack food giant behind brands

including Cadbury's, Toblerone, Dairylea and Philadelphia.

So, why are the manufacturers so reluctant to use

the traffic light labelling, especially when you consider that,

as consumers, we buy millions of their products every single day?

Well, a recent survey showed that 40% of women and 30% of men

are actually put off buying a product

when they see the red traffic light because that indicates

that it's high in salt, fat or sugar.

So, could it be that manufacturers are really worried that once

we see what's actually in their products we wouldn't buy them?

In fact, while that may be true for some of them,

it's not the whole story.

After all, other big names whose products are likely to score

red for some ingredients - companies like Pepsi, Mars and Nestle -

have signed up and will display the traffic light labels.

So we asked the main companies resisting the scheme

if we could interview them to find out why.

None of them wanted to appear on camera

to discuss their opposition to traffic light labelling.

OK, all right, many thanks.

Instead, some provided written responses,

which all said much the same thing -

that they're keeping an open mind

on the best labelling system for consumers.

They believe that the nutritional information

they already have on their products is clear and transparent.

They also worry that the serving size used in the Government scheme

can be unfair.

For instance, United Biscuits say that they think it's more

useful to show the nutritional content per biscuit

rather than per 100g, as the Government wants,

pointing out that 100g would be quite a lot of digestives.

Now, you might wonder why it is that the British Government doesn't

simply force food manufacturers to use the traffic light system.

It would certainly make life a lot simpler.

Well, the answer lies across the Channel in Brussels.

Now, food labelling is part of European law

but, so far, the EU has not recognised

the traffic light system and made it compulsory

and that means that, here in Britain, it has to be voluntary.

And, as a result, with so many companies refusing to take part,

it's thought that only around 60% of the food industry will be

using the traffic light labels that are currently being rolled out.

But the Department of Health hopes that consumer pressure will

persuade companies to join.

They told us that...

And they're confident that consistent front-of-pack labelling

will give people the information they need to make healthier choices.

It does seem true that shoppers prefer this type of labelling,

which, it's hoped, will make it easier to compare

the foods on the supermarket shelves.

But, with no way of making it mandatory and some in the

industry adamant that the labels are not fair to their products,

don't hold your breath for a scheme that covers everything you buy.

As we've been finding out throughout this series, it's not always

easy to work out exactly what's in the food we eat so,

unless you cook something yourself, you're rather at the mercy of

the food manufacturers. Not least because, while sometimes

the name of a product made make you think it contains a particular

ingredient, you might find, in fact, it does nothing of the kind.

Stopping to forensically examine the packaging may not always be

top of our shopping list when we're whizzing round this market

with other things on our minds.

But sometimes what's inside the packaging isn't quite what the

name or the flavour on the outside might lead you to believe.

Take a look at this ramen noodle soup for example.

Chilli beef flavour. Just a quick look, though,

as if you were making that instant decision in the shop.

So, what would you expect these noodles to have in them?

Well, whatever else they've got, one thing is missing and that's beef.

And what about this wibbly-wobbly favourite?

With the pot promising a new fruitier taste,

you might hope there'd be strawberries in there. Er...no.

It might taste fruity but inside you won't find any fruit at all.

The only way to know that would be to study the ingredients in detail

but how many of us always do that when we're out shopping?

I'm here at Birmingham's wonderful Bullring Market

where if you can be certain of one thing it's if you buy an apple

it contains apple and nothing else.

But processed foods are not so straightforward.

So how easily can Birmingham's shoppers spot what's what

when it comes to prepared foods?

We've bought three noodle products that proudly have the word

"beef" on the label.

Only one actually contains any beef at all,

and even then, it only has 1.8% beef in the whole thing.

So, which is it? We're asking shoppers, "where's the beef?"

And as they try and guess, we'll also find out what they'd expect

from these products from just that very first quick look at the label.

Underneath these three tureens are three items that you would find

if you were doing your supermarket shop, they would be on the shelves,

and they've all got the word "beef" on them, OK?

But only one of them actually contains any beef.

The others have no beef at all.

So, which of those three products do our shoppers think has the beef in?

-That one.

-That one.

But if they're not finding the packaging instantly helpful,

one thing is clear - confusion reigns.

-We haven't got to taste them?

-No, no. It's all done by looks Because it's got beef written on it.

-It does say beef.

-They all do.

They all do. That's the point. They've all got the word beef.

To me, as a shopper, if it says beef on it, it should be beef, end of story.

Well, they just make it more difficult for you, don't they? All the time, you know.

They must think we're stupid.

When you see beef you expect a little beef, but it's terrible, really.

Surely there's one man on the market who should be able to tell

the beef from the beef-less.

With your butcher's hat on, which one do you think has got the beef?

It's between them two.

I'm going to go for the Pot Noodle.

-The sad news is you've unerringly picked the two that have no beef in them.

-Oh, no! Right.

And the one that has got the beef is that one there.

How do you feel about the fact that they all said they were beef something or other,

and it's turned out that only one of them is?

It's misrepresentation there, isn't it?

-I mean...

-if I was selling minced beef

and then put something that said "lamb" on it, I'd get done straightaway.

It might seem like basic common sense -

if it says beef on the packet, you'll find beef in the packet,

but with plenty of our foods, it's not that simple.

So how can food manufacturers get away with suggesting

an ingredient that isn't actually there?

It all boils down to the regulations, and in fact to one little word.

and that word is "flavour."

And that word is the get-out-of-jail-free card for the food companies.

If something is labelled as flavour, so beef flavour or prawn flavour, etc,

it doesn't actually have to contain any of the apparently key ingredient at all.

So none of these products are made using even the tiniest bit

of foods that the name may make you think are inside.

But they're not breaking any rules.

As long as it's there somewhere,

that magic word flavour doesn't need to be the same size

as the name of the ingredient you may think you are buying but aren't.

So, better make sure you take your specs on the supermarket run.

But should we really have to look at the packaging quite so closely?

What do the experts say?

Most manufacturers would say, you've only got to turn the product over

and you can see the exact ingredients that are there.

On the other hand, from the consumer's perspective,

we've got to remember that we don't take lots of time checking

everything out, and we do make short cuts,

so if we see something that we can immediately recognise,

like beef flavour, we're going to probably most of the time assume that it has got some beef in it.

So what would happen if the food companies made it easier for us

by changing their labels to spell out not what isn't in their products

but instead what they actually DO contain?

Their packets would certainly look rather different.

Hartley's ready to eat strawberry jelly. Flavouring created in a lab.

No strawberry whatsoever.

colouring derived from powdered insect bodies,

and therefore not suitable for vegetarians.

And this Uncle Ben's savoury chicken rice. You guessed it...

No chicken whatsoever. Just chicken flavour.

So meat free, even a veggie can tuck in.

Spelling things out would certainly make things easier for time-strapped shoppers,

but it probably wouldn't be as lucrative.

So I think it's this issue about responsibility from the point of view of manufacturers,

but I think if we had a manufacturer here most of them would say, you know,

that may just be too much information

and it may put people off buying something that is a perfectly good product.

When we contacted the manufacturers of the examples we've shown,

they all said it certainly isn't their intention to mislead anyone

with regard to the labelling and contents of their product.

The two noodle companies that didn't include beef reiterated

that their packs have the word flavour clearly stated to avoid confusion,

and that they satisfy all labelling regulations.

They also point out that the packaging makes clear their beef flavour products

are suitable for vegetarians,

whereas Hartley's told us their strawberry jelly now has a new label.

But there is one further thing to keep in mind when you are trying to figure out

if there actually is prawn in your prawn cocktail crisps or beef

in your beef noodles, and this time it comes down to two extra letters.

If the label says "flavoured" rather than simply "flavour",

it must contain that ingredient.

It's a lot to remember when you're trying to make sense of the packaging quickly,

especially in the middle of a shop, but with the rules on labelling

unlikely to change any time soon, it seems there's no way round it.

If in doubt, you'll just have to plough through the small print on the label.

As consumers we need to be aware that this is what manufacturers and advertisers do,

and take it with a bit of a pinch of salt.

The consequences of inaccurate and even fake information on food

and drink labels sold in the UK can be very serious indeed.

When the authorities find examples that don't meet British rules,

they are often sent here, to the Kent laboratory of our food science expert, Dr Peter Maynard.

Yet another mystery place you have taken me to in your laboratory!

It's your naughty room, really.

Yeah, there are certainly a lot of naughty samples in here, yes.

What's the system? I see obviously lots of different areas, so who sends you this stuff?

Well, a lot of different counties or Environmental Health.

And then what happens?

We do the analysis that is required, and then we'll

look at the actual product and its labelling and compare it with the legislation.

So, for instance, this one you can see is a nice red soft drink,

but it's made in America, made in the USA,

and instead of having allura red in the list of ingredients,

it's got red 40. Well, no-one knows what red 40 is.

So in this case the labelling is not correct according to European standards?

The labelling is not correct. If it was made in Europe,

it would not only have to say allura red, but it would have to say

that it might cause hyperactivity in children.

-That is not a requirement in America.

-Really? I'm surprised.

So therefore, if this came from Cambridgeshire, it means that

-you would send that back and say, "this can't be sold here?"

-Yes.

What do you think of the labelling on that one?

I mean, even an nonexpert...

Even without my glasses I can see there's not one word of English on it!

Who knows what's in it? I don't know what's in it.

-Of course. And was this actually on sale?

-Oh, yes, in Europe.

-So, don't buy this in Hertfordshire, eh?

-Don't buy it anywhere.

-Will that now be taken off the market?

-I hope so.

-I'm enjoying this.

-Ah!

-Suffolk.

-This is where you keep the booze, eh?

-A bottle of gin.

-Yes.

-And there is no English on it at all.

So things like this should have on the back a UK duty stamp.

Now, because it doesn't have a duty stamp,

it means it's been imported illegally.

-And of course you get a lot of counterfeit stuff coming in to be tested, don't you?

-Yes.

Is there anything that would give you a signal that it's counterfeit?

There are sometimes very subtle differences.

Sometimes the duty stamp is present, but it doesn't fluoresce,

and it should be a fluorescent stamp.

Sometimes the label is slightly off centre,

sometimes it is variable in very small other ways.

But basically these days, the labels, the counterfeit labels, are very good.

I suppose the problem is that again you don't know what's in it,

so there could be some harmful substances in it

-that you don't know about.

-That's certainly true. Yes.

In fact, we analysed a sample of gin a month or so ago

-which turned out to be mainly methanol and would actually...

-Which is...

-Which is very poisonous indeed, and which actually killed a young woman that drank it.

-Really?

So this is the kind of thing that we can find wrong with spirits in particular.

So some of the stuff in your naughty room is very naughty indeed.

Yeah. Some of it can kill you, there's no doubt about it.

Earlier in the programme we heard from viewers not surprisingly

unhappy about the hidden ingredients the food industry uses,

but that could cause more than just a surprise.

Sometimes the consequences of even tiny, tiny quantities

of unexpected things in your food can be very serious indeed.

Busy mum of twins, Justine Bold, used to be a high-flying marketing executive,

a role which involved its fair share of wining and dining.

She had always been sensitive to what she ate,

but then the situation started to become more serious.

I had been having these episodes where I couldn't breathe.

They would start with itching in my mouth and throat

and it would sort of progress downwards

and then I would actually be really struggling for breath.

And feeling very dizzy. Sometimes I would vomit.

But worst of all was what happened when she got home one evening

after a Thai curry and a few glasses of wine.

Justine thought she was going into an anaphylactic shock.

I went to the Royal Brompton and they did a series of tests

skin prick tests and blood tests, and the results were all negative,

but I carried on having reactions.

So because it was affecting my breathing they were quite worried about it.

They decided they would do some food challenges with me,

which is where they took me into hospital for the day

and they would feed some of the foods to me

that had been eaten around the time that I had a reaction,

and it was on about the third food challenge that I reacted to some strawberry jam.

The dietician there and the doctor looked at my food diary

and looked at all of the ingredients in the jam

and worked out that it was probably the sulphites.

Sulphites. "What's that?" you might ask.

Well, sulphites hardly register with most of us,

but in fact we probably eat them every day.

They're used in the production of many foods

and almost all wine to prevent them going off.

So look at the labels for products including crisps, marmalade,

jam, cider and frozen prawns

and you'll see additives such as sulphur dioxide which contain sulphites -

harmless enough for most, but for those with an allergy,

the reaction can be pretty nasty.

It had a huge impact on my life because not only did I think

I might actually have a fatal attack because I was at times going blue,

having very low oxygen levels, very low blood pressure,

going into a type of shock where it's quite dangerous medically.

So, trying to deal with that when you're in your 20s is quite...

You know, it's quite a big thing to come to terms with.

And then I used to get quite angry and resentful.

Above a certain level, the law requires that producers of

processed foods have to label their products as containing sulphites.

The problem can be the allergy sufferers like Justine may

react to levels of whatever they're allergic to that are so tiny

they would be below the amount that would even trigger the need to label.

I do remember actually going to a friend's house for supper

and going through this long list of what I couldn't eat,

and she'd made sort of food to accommodate me,

and she said she'd made an Eton mess for pudding,

and I ate some of the Eton mess and I was actually very ill,

and it turned out that she had made her Eton mess with glace cherries.

Those had been preserved using the dreaded sulphites.

Food is such a big, big part of our lives of the food allergy

was just making life miserable for Justine.

The effect of the allergy made me feel quite socially isolated

and separated from my friends because I had to think twice

about eating out or socialising,

and so that had a very profound effect.

And she's far from being alone.

Campaign groups insist that there is a long-term rising trend of food allergies in the UK.

Allergies are increasing enormously

and have been doing for the last 30, 40 years.

And the increase escalates with each decade,

and at the moment particularly, food allergy in children is very worrying

because it's really rising dramatically.

The biggest problems occur when unexpected things turn up in your food

which can mean allergy sufferers have no idea

that they're eating an ingredient that can do serious harm to them.

Dr Isabel Skypala runs the food allergy clinic

at the Royal Brompton Hospital where Justine was treated.

She has seen just how extreme reactions to hidden foodstuffs can be.

There's a whole spectrum of reactions.

Some people just get itching in their mouth,

which is a very common reaction in adults,

right the way through, really,

to people having to be hospitalised,

having breathing difficulties and fainting,

and not being able to swallow.

And obviously, ultimately, anaphylaxis can result in death,

so they can be very severe.

On the labelling front, though, there is hope that the situation

is set to get a lot clearer in the near future with an increase in the number of ingredients

that manufacturers must highlight on the label.

By December 2014, regulation will come into effect that states

that manufacturers have to include in the main list of ingredients

any of the 14 named allergens in bold writing.

Now, although that's good news, it doesn't solve the problem when you are eating out,

which can be one of the trickiest things for allergy sufferers,

who sometimes end up taking their chances with menus that contain very scant information.

As, indeed, Justine found out.

I have a rule in my own life which is, if there is any doubt,

then I don't eat it.

There are obviously issues of cross contamination.

I'd like to see clearer labelling of restaurant...

Allergy labelling of restaurant food.

But here, too, there is progress.

After December '14, restaurants, hotels,

caterers will be required to state what allergens are in their food,

and to provide the facility for people to be able to talk to the chef

or to somebody who is in the know about what is in that food.

That's a definite improvement.

However, for Justine, there's one more thing that would make life a whole lot easier,

and that's if manufacturers used fewer allergy triggering ingredients

in their products in the first place.

I think they could be more mindful of the list of allergenic foods

and what they put them in.

And don't put them in if they're not absolutely necessary.

Now, here's the question -

how do some of our favourite brands keep us coming back for more?

PR and marketing expert Jonathan Gabay has been

working in the advertising industry for 30 years,

so he knows a few of the clever ways that manufacturers can make

those trusted varieties still seem very fresh.

As consumers, we sometimes get a bit bored.

In fact, we're quite fickle wind comes to brands.

That's why brands, what they do,

is occasionally they zhoosh up their current offering by improving the taste,

or something along that kind of lines.

So what happens is you go, see the packaging,

and think to yourself - "Ah, I trust that brand,

"and look at this - it's even better, it's even tastier.

"I think I'll have some."

Brands know that they only have your attention for a very short

space of time, so in that few seconds they need to convince you

that their product isn't just the one you want, but the best.

Greatest taste ever!

Whoa! I'm exaggerating. Or am I exaggerating?

What is the best taste ever?

Well, unless I can substantiate what I'm saying in terms of best taste ever,

I've got to shut up.

The laws around advertising standards mean that brands

have to be able to back up those bold claims.

Look at this. I spotted this packaging this morning.

It says here, "No. 1 for taste." Fair enough.

Have they substantiated it? Answer - yes.

It says here "based on a survey of 721 cereal consumers."

So in this case, I think it would be more than reasonable to say,

yes, they've substantiated that they are number one.

But other phrases that brands use to whet your appetite can be less easy to quantify.

For example, "authentically British."

What is authentically British?

Now, a brand could produce a product that says it is authentically,

in fact, even quintessentially British,

but it's not actually produced in Great Britain, so then what?

They could argue that it is still quintessentially British

because of its heritage.

If you're still confused, we have some very helpful tips to

help you unravel the labels on our website.

Here at Rip-Off Britain, we are always ready to investigate

more of your stories, and not just about food.

Confused over your bills or just trying to wade through never-ending small print?

Why is it in small print if they want you to read it, you know?

Maybe you are unsure about what to do when you discover that

you've lost out, and that great deal has actually ended up costing you money.

All my money is very hard-earned, so when I go to spend it,

I expect value for money.

Or you might have a cautionary tale of your own

and might want to share the mistakes that you've made with us.

You can write to us at:

Or send us an e-mail to:

The Rip-Off team is ready and waiting to investigate your stories.

So it seems that when it comes to food, you don't necessarily

get what it says on the tin, or when the tin does say it,

it might be in very tiny, tiny writing, which is why

any greater clarity on the label as to what exactly you are getting has got to be good news.

Absolutely, and not least because when you are out shopping

there just aren't enough hours in the day, are there, to stop and check every tiny little detail.

You just want to be able to have a quick glance

and then be confident that you really are getting what you think you are,

with no hidden extras or nasty surprises later on.

-You just want to trust it, don't you, really?

-Exactly.

Well, I hope you will keep sending us examples of food labels

that you think are unclear or even misleading.

You've been very good at that and we appreciate it.

And in the meantime do bear in mind that the packaging

and even the name may be creating an expectation that the reality simply doesn't match up to.

Well, that's where we have to leave it for today.

We'll be back looking into more secrets of the food business very, very soon.

-But until then...

-Keep reading the labels!

-Remember your glasses! From all of us, bye-bye.

-Bye-bye.