Episode 10 Rip Off Britain

-ANGELA:

-There's 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.

You think you're getting a bargain

and you're not really,

they're just encouraging you to buy more of a product

when you don't need to.

JULIA: Whether you're staying in or going out,

you've told us you can feel ripped off

by the promises made about what you eat

and what you pay for it.

What really winds me up, I suppose,

is the price of so-called healthy food

when compared with the unhealthy stuff.

The unhealthy stuff seems to be so much cheaper.

-GLORIA:

-From claims that just don't stack up

to the secrets behind the packaging,

we'll uncover the truth about Britain's food

so that you can be sure that you're getting what you expect

at the right price.

Your food, your money.

This is Rip-Off Britain.

Hello, and welcome to Rip-Off Britain,

where this series we're focusing on something

that all of us just can't do without,

and that's our food.

And today, we'll be finding out

the truth about some of the foods we rush to buy,

because we think they'll be really good for us

and those we avoid, because we think they're bad.

So the question is, have we got it all wrong?

Are we just scared of the stuff that's absolutely fine,

and wasting our money on products that,

despite what they claim,

are no better for us than anything else?

Well, to find out, we'll be unpicking

some of the health scares and the food fads

that we've all pretty much swallowed wholesale,

to see which of them should be believed.

So, whether it's one those food scares

that's been going on for the last 50 years or so,

to the foods, the juices and the potions

that we're told are going to transform how we feel.

Hopefully, by the end of this programme,

we'll have cut through enough of that hype

so that you are going be much better informed

the next time you're deciding

whether or not you're going to spend your money

on what seems to be a healthy choice.

Coming up, three letters that spell out

one of the most controversial ingredients in food around.

But is there really anything to worry about with MSG?

It's not unpleasant.

Actually, funnily enough,

-it's making my taste buds work.

-Yes.

You know, sometimes we hear so much negative stuff

about a particular ingredient in our food

that we might be prepared to swallow

whatever is being said

without necessarily questioning it.

And there are those who would say that's very much the case

with a particular additive that is often found in savoury foods,

MSG, or monosodium glutamate.

Now, over the years, it's caused so much controversy

that, although still very widely used,

it's considered by many to be a nasty chemical

that is best avoided.

And indeed, there are companies and restaurants

that proudly boast that they don't use it.

But has MSG gained its poor reputation for no good reason?

And could it be that, in fact,

there isn't really anything wrong with it at all?

This innocent-looking white powder has been blamed for everything

from general feelings of weakness, to heart disease,

asthma to depression.

It's MSG, or monosodium glutamate.

And, after one of the world's longest-running food scares,

there are scores of people

who won't buy or eat anything that contains it.

I would avoid it if possible, if I knew,

if it was on the packaging or whatever.

It's bad for you but we do eat it.

It's not good for me at all.

MSG is a flavour enhancer

that over the years has been widely used in lots of foods,

from crisps to takeaways and gravy.

But if the horror stories that started in the late 1960s

are to be believed,

it's something we should steer well clear of.

Back then, the supposed effects of too much MSG -

headaches, numbness and even palpitations -

were dubbed "Chinese Restaurant Syndrome".

In the following years,

it was linked to brain lesions in mice,

and in the decades since,

some have even claimed a link to blindness.

But alongside all those terrifying medical reports,

there was plenty of other research

that found MSG had no ill effects at all.

Trouble is, it wasn't those studies

that stuck in the public consciousness.

It does give me headaches, actually.

Too much of it gives me a headache.

I think it's bad for you,

because it's quite an artificial ingredient.

It just doesn't make me feel at all good.

Um, like heart racing, palpitations, that sort of thing.

and, um, extreme thirst afterwards.

But is MSG's poor reputation really deserved?

I've come to the University of Hertfordshire

to meet toxicologist Professor Rob Chilcott.

Why has glutamate had such a bad press?

Well, it all started in the late 1960s,

and a physician went for a meal with his wife

at a Chinese restaurant.

And after the meal, he felt that he had a tightness of chest

and some flushing of the skin.

And he found that every time he went to a Chinese restaurant,

it was quite a repeating experience.

And it was that physician who coined the term

"Chinese restaurant syndrome"

and published a paper speculating on what might have caused it.

That prompted the scientific world to investigate,

and soon, the finger was being pointed at MSG,

even though no-one could really agree on the symptoms

that it was supposed to cause.

The symptoms and the signs of MSG exposure,

always seemed to be a little different

depending on who you spoke to.

Why was that?

Probably because a lot of it was a placebo effect.

So, eating food which you think is going to effect you,

will probably have an effect.

In the years that followed,

conflicting reports and studies have continued to appear,

some drawing worrying conclusions,

others unable to prove anything.

Of course, a lot of tests were done in the '70s

which produced some rather alarming results.

They were looking at very high doses,

which are not really representative of the sort of amounts of MSG

you get in a diet.

But even so, there is no evidence to suggest whatsoever

that monosodium glutamate is toxic.

Meanwhile, there is scientific evidence

to suggest that lots of other things that we consume every day

and think are innocuous

are, theoretically, much more dangerous than MSG,

including one we'll all definitely have had

and probably in the last few hours.

A great example is a compound you might have heard of

called dihydrogen monoxide, or DHMO.

Now, DHMO is actually quite toxic.

If you inhale it, you can die,

if you ingest it in large enough quantities,

it causes an electrolyte imbalance which can kill you.

So you would think that there'd be a move

to ban DHMO from our foods.

But, of course, DHMO is water.

Well, despite MSG being so controversial,

you'll still find it in the ingredients list

of a whole host of everyday foods.

The label might not even mention MSG.

Instead, you might see it described as "natural flavourings"

or by its E number, E621.

And the reason it continues to be so widely used

is because it is actually a really powerful flavour enhancer,

boosting the impact of one of the fundamental tastes

that we commonly come across,

even if we never knew that it actually had its own name.

It's a taste known as umami,

a Japanese word that can mean savoury or deliciousness.

There are five major tastes.

There's sweet, salty, sour and bitter.

And the fifth one is umami,

which is this one which monosodium glutamate

really brings out the flavour in food.

So Rob is giving me all of these five common tastes to try.

The first few are very familiar,

but the last one, the one that has that umami taste,

I can't honestly say I recall ever trying before.

Oh!

It's bizarre. I was expecting sweet.

-It...it's savoury.

-Yes.

Yes, it's very savoury!

Feels like I've had a sort of soggy chip.

HE LAUGHS

But is it a pleasant taste or a...?

It's not unpleasant.

Definitely not unpleasant.

Actually, funnily enough, what it's doing is

-it's making my taste buds work.

-Yes.

Mmm, what is it?

That's actually...

monosodium glutamate.

Oh, right!

It's not just scientists who understand how MSG works

to bring out that umami flavour in foods.

Chef Heston Blumenthal, for example,

actively adds MSG to some of his foods,

recently declaring that it's a really important element of taste,

and the idea that there's anything bad about it

is simply an old wives' tale.

And experts like Rob would say that there is no need to avoid it,

because the official advice from the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation

is that MSG is safe for the vast majority of people.

So maybe this much-maligned ingredient

is about to come back into fashion,

bringing an end to one of the longest-running food scares

of modern times.

One that, many now say,

should never have become so widely accepted in the first place.

Still to come on Rip-Off Britain,

the quick-fix detox solutions

promising to energise and revitalise your body.

But is your wallet the only thing they're really clearing out?

There is no evidence that you can detoxify your body

with any of these products.

Not one of them has a single scientific study

to back up the use of its products.

Now, for decades, cutting something completely out of your diet

has been the starting point for countless diets

and apparently healthy-eating regimes.

And all of those diets really boosted sales of products

sold as being "free from" this, or "free from" that.

Products that were developed for people with a genuine need

to exclude something from their diet.

But now, they're eagerly snapped up

by people who don't have that need,

but just want to avoid particular ingredients

as a lifestyle choice.

Now, these free-from goods

fill up whole aisles of the supermarket these days.

But according to nutritionists,

some of the people buying them are spending well over the odds

on products that will give them no benefit whatsoever.

Whether it's products made without dairy, gluten or wheat,

the market in foods that are free-from

a particular ingredient is booming.

In 2014, it was worth a whopping £365 million pounds,

and it's growing.

These foods were developed for the 2% of people in the UK

who have a genuine medical reason,

for example, an intolerance,

for cutting something out of their diet.

But with up to a third of us reckoned to have bought them,

what exactly is that that we're buying into?

Nutrition therapist Ian Marber has coeliac disease,

meaning he simply can't eat gluten.

So he really does need to eat gluten-free food.

But he believes that anyone who buys it when they don't need to

is falling for a fad.

Gluten-free foods were previously only found in health food stores.

They sort of really promoted the idea that it's healthy,

that gluten-free food is better than normal food.

It doesn't necessarily mean that

the gluten-free version of regular food is actually better,

it's just gluten-free.

Ian believes that some shoppers

don't really understand the point of free-from foods,

and we took him out to put his theory to the test.

Do you know what gluten is?

Well, unlike a lot of people,

you hear about it, you know you should avoid it.

Which one would you say, of those two, was healthier?

Which one looks healthier and feels healthier?

The green one.

Is that because of the colour, or because it says gluten-free?

-Probably because of the colour...

-OK.

..and, um, you've got it's free from gluten,

wheat-free and milk-free.

What's happened is that the word gluten-free

has actually become the shorthand for healthy

in the same way that organic or low-fat is.

It gives that aura of health.

Apparently, 42% of the population believe gluten is man-made,

and I think this just underlines the idea that gluten is a bad thing.

It's a poison, it's a toxin that has to be got rid of.

Gluten is the general name

for the proteins found in various grains, such as wheat,

that make so many staple foods in our diets.

It's the stuff that holds bread or pasta together,

acting like a form of glue.

And what particularly worries Ian

is that the way gluten-free foods are formulated

may mean that if you don't need them,

these foods can actually be less healthy

than their regular counterparts.

Gluten gives food a chewiness and a texture,

which is difficult to recreate.

So manufacturers will attempt to recreate that

by using more sugar,

they can use more gum, sometimes more fat.

Now, for someone who's coeliac,

the fact that it's gluten-free is the most important thing,

and they might be able to overlook the extra calories, the extra fat.

But if you're not coeliac,

and you don't necessarily need to be gluten-free,

you might be kidding yourself thinking it's healthier

because you are just taking on more calories and more sugar.

And for many people,

free-from foods are now proving controversial for another reason...

the cost.

A number of Rip-Off Britain viewers have been in touch

to say that they feel that they're being penalised

by having to pay more for these foods

just because they have an allergy,

and they don't think that that's fair.

Sally Waters wrote in very unhappy

that while 1kg of regular porridge costs 75p,

the gluten-free equivalent costs a whopping £7.72.

Wendy Laverick from County Durham e-mailed saying that...

And Leanne Nuttall from Manchester e-mailed us making the same points.

She too has coeliac disease,

and eating anything with gluten in it

can trigger stomach cramps, tiredness and vomiting,

so her shopping list matters more than most.

I have to have a gluten and wheat-free diet

because my body just won't accept it,

and if I try and eat it, I get extremely poorly.

Erm, you can get to the case where I can be in hospital,

it can be that bad.

Leanne was only diagnosed around ten years ago,

and when she first ventured out to her supermarket

to do a gluten-free weekly shop,

she was shocked to find out how much more it cost.

Most people, especially if you're new to being a coeliac,

you'll go straight to the free-from section

and pay probably triple the price.

Tonight, for our tea,

I'm going to have my own gluten and wheat-free chicken pie,

and they're going to have just a normal, average steak pie.

Erm, obviously, I've had to buy two separate boxes.

My gluten and wheat-free one cost me nearly four quid for two pies.

Theirs, for a pack of four, two quid.

Again, big price difference, especially when you're on a budget.

Leanne and the other viewers who contacted us on this

have one simple question

they'd like the manufacturers of all these free-from foods to answer.

Just why are they so expensive?

So we sent Leanne to meet Tobias Kaerst

at a food lab not too far away from where she lives

to find out more about what ingredients

go into her gluten-free food

that makes it so much more pricey.

As you can see, there's obviously a wide range of more ingredients

in the gluten-free one.

I am actually shocked on how much more ingredients there is

for a gluten-free bread compared to a gluten bread.

Well, there's a reason for this, obviously.

With the gluten bread, you obviously get the gluten

which are really, really important as an ingredient for bread.

And somehow, we need to rebuild this using other ingredients

to have the same effect.

Do you think that contributes then to the big price difference?

It does, definitely.

But the main ingredient obviously being used in our bread

is the gluten flour, the wheat flour,

which is grown in this country and everywhere.

With this flour, which we need to use in a gluten-free bread,

we have different flours in there and starches

which are not so common.

Because the gluten is the main ingredient

that holds bread together,

it's very hard to replicate its effects and quality for coeliacs.

Very often find with the gluten-free bread

it's very dry and sometimes it's like cardboard.

Well, this is where food product development technologists

do work on it

and trying, hopefully, to find a solution,

which is a gluten-free product

which is as close as it comes to bread.

Well, I hope they'll come up with something soon

cos I miss a decent sandwich. THEY LAUGH

-GLORIA LAUGHS

-Good girl.

Now, the ongoing technological research

and the rarer ingredients used all add to the price,

but Leanne isn't satisfied with what she has to pay for.

The high price is there because you don't have any gluten in there,

and that's the importance of it.

But I think the price needs to reflect its quality.

We're working on it

so that you can have a proper sandwich at one stage

which is like gluten bread.

-So I'm going hold you to that.

-You can.

I was actually really shocked.

I didn't realise how much ingredients actually went into the bread.

I'm not as negative towards it.

While Leanne looks forward to the day

when she can enjoy tasty and affordable gluten-free bread,

back at the market, Ian Marber agrees with her

that the higher prices for free-from foods

can be very hard to understand,

especially now that so many people are buying them.

The cost is some way justified,

but it still doesn't explain why sometimes gluten-free food

is double the original.

I can understand 10, 15, 20% more, but certainly not double.

I think the gluten-free market has established itself

as being a certain price

and it's unlikely that's really going to change,

certainly not in the consumer's favour.

I bet, like me, many of you find it hard to avoid temptation

and only eat the things that are good for you.

That's one reason why lots of companies sell

what appear to be a perfect, quick-fix solution.

All manner of products that promise to cleanse and detox our bodies.

In effect, undoing all the bad things we might have done to ourselves.

But when we took a closer look at the bold claims

behind some of the remedies you can buy,

it became clear that while you may think

you're giving your body a crucial overhaul,

all that's really being cleaned out may be your wallet.

Feeling run down? Low on energy?

Poor digestion?

Well, according to some companies,

what you need to do is detox.

But most doctors and experts say that's plain bunkum.

Even so, the detox industry is big business.

And whether it's off the shelf products from high street stores

or special potions and juices delivered to your door,

there's no shortage of companies peddling detox regimes

that claim to cleanse your body and rid it of nasty toxins.

And that's a message that's really appealed

to Eliza Flynn from London.

Eliza's a health writer

and spends a lot of time reviewing health foods and products.

But for her, it's more than just a professional interest,

she's determined to keep her own body in tiptop shape.

And she shares all her thoughts and ideas

on her food and fitness blog.

I started my blog

because I was really interested in trying out

different fitness classes

and, obviously, with fitness there comes food

because you also have to eat well

um, as well as do exercise,

and I love food.

Eliza has tried numerous health regimes and detoxes in the past.

And her blog means that companies

often send her free samples to try and review.

So when one business asked her

to try a new kind of juice detox she'd never had before,

she jumped at the chance.

For the juice detox,

you're sent a whole box of juices

and there's eight for each day for three days.

And that's a mixture of different fruit and vegetable juices,

and you generally have these every two hours.

I don't think I had any expectations,

but I had heard that I could expect to feel lighter, more energised,

my skin could be better, I could sleep better.

Eliza was trying a detox regime

using juices from the company Press,

whose website spelled out the apparent benefits

using all sorts of scientific terms

to describe how the body was actually detoxified.

"This fasting causes our body

"to move from the sympathetic nervous system

"to the parasympathetic nervous system,

"where it can begin to detoxify and heal."

Eliza's juice detox meant she had to go without solid food

for three whole days,

which wasn't always easy.

The only issue I did have with the juice detox

was when my boyfriend was cooking,

um, like, cinnamon buns for breakfast

and I was there with my green juice

and there's only so many green juices you can have.

But in the end, Eliza was convinced it was all worth it.

After the juice detox,

I definitely felt a lot cleaner

and I know that, in terms of stomach-wise,

I didn't feel so bloated,

um, and I definitely had a flatter tummy.

So, is Eliza right in thinking

her body was cleansed of nasty toxins by the juices?

Or is she barking up completely the wrong tree

and feeling better for another reason entirely?

We've brought her to meet clinical dietician Lucy Jones

to see what she makes of such treatments.

Is it possible to detox your body

using products that are out there at the moment?

Such as, you've got tea bags, there's smoothies, juices, etc.

There is no evidence that you can detoxify your body

with any of these products.

And these products are very clever,

that when you look at what they promote about their product

they don't tell you what toxins they're detoxifying

or how they do that,

so there's nothing we can measure.

So not one of them has a single scientific study

to back up the use of its products

cos we never really know what it's doing.

So it stays very vague on its science

in order to make it sound more authoritative.

And it soon becomes clear that

Lucy doesn't think any detox products are necessary at all,

because the body is perfectly good at detoxifying itself.

Our body is a really complicated detoxifying machine.

We continually detoxify our bodies

through a series of chemical reactions taking place

from the lungs, the skin, the liver, the bowel, the kidneys

and all of these organs work all the time

to help detoxify your body.

What there isn't any evidence for

is that you can make them work more effectively

or speed up the process

by using any of these products.

And there are some who'd say the prices of these products

are every bit as inflated as their health claims.

A quick hunt online shows up detox products

that cost as much as £81 for each day's treatment.

And even the one that Eliza tried

would normally cost £149

for the three-day supply of juices.

All of which might be a reasonable price to pay

if there was a body of scientific evidence

to back up what they say they do.

But Lucy, in common with all the other experts we've spoken to,

is adamant that there isn't.

And she's not remotely convinced when Eliza reads to her

some of the claims that a variety of detox products have made

to explain how they're supposed to work.

"These toxins are stored in fat cells, tissues,

"bodily organs, even the brain.

"Fatigue, allergies, weight gain, low energy,

"poor immunity and many other health conditions

"are all signs that we're not detoxifying properly."

That's an unbelievable claim.

So, basically, what they're saying is,

no matter what's wrong with you,

all you need to do is use their product.

I just think it's...it's terrible.

It's really preying on people's health conditions

and health concerns

and there's absolutely no evidence to back this up at all.

The organs they're talking about,

things like the liver, the kidneys, the colon,

actually, we don't store toxins there,

they convert them and eliminate them.

That's the job of those organs.

But even if there's no proof that detoxes actually work,

there's no escaping that the juice one Eliza tried

did make her feel better.

I really enjoyed the juice cleanse

and I felt there were some personal benefits for me,

so what is the problem with that?

Oh, there's nothing wrong with that

and nobody can change your experience.

What we're looking at is,

will surviving off juices alone over three days,

paying an awful lot of money to a company to do so,

actually meet the health claims that it purports?

And in this sense, none of the products that we've looked at

actually have any evidence to support those claims.

Of course, the companies behind these lucrative products would disagree.

So we asked six of them to prove the science

behind the claims they make for their detox products.

But only one replied,

and that was the one whose juice cleanse Eliza tested out, Press.

It told us it's working with nutritionists to clarify...

But acknowledged that, for now...

The company argues that these days, detox is...

..and can mean anything

that involves you taking a break from the...

..that are part of modern-day life.

For example, laying off alcohol for a weekend.

As such, its juice cleanse is aimed at...

..to allow the body some time to "redress the balance".

And it said that, like Eliza,

90% of their thousand or so clients

say they've experienced positive results.

As for Eliza herself,

despite hearing how critical the medical profession can be

of the detox industry as a whole,

she remains open-minded.

I don't think its right that these companies

are using such terms on their websites

and to sell their products

if there's no scientific basis in it.

I think, for me, though,

I felt a lot of benefit from doing a juice detox

and so I'd do one again.

Here at Rip-Off Britain,

we're always ready to investigate more of your stories on any subject.

Confused over your bills

or just trying to wade through never-ending small print?

It's very frustrating

because it makes what should be a quite simple job

a lot more complicated,

and I think some people just give up,

and so they don't get the best deal.

Maybe you're unsure what to do when you discover you've lost out

and that so-called great deal has ended up costing you money.

People are buying into this.

I did, you know,

and are they going to be as awkward with them as they were with me?

You might have a cautionary tale of your own

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

Well, it upsets me an awful lot

because, you know, I'm retired

and I...begrudge having to pay that kind of money out.

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.

Well, as we've seen,

when so many of us really care about what the food we eat

is doing to our bodies,

it doesn't take much to get us rushing to buy something

we're told is good for us

or shunning something we think isn't,

even if the reality of the health message behind it all

doesn't completely stack up.

And how true is that?

Well, sometimes, all those press stories

and very clever marketing

might mean that what we've been told previously

is what really sticks in the memory

long after it's turned out either to be exaggerated,

or worse, completely untrue.

And, of course, we want to believe that

we're doing the right things for these gorgeous bodies.

-Our temples.

-Don't we just, don't we just.

So the next time that you're shopping,

take a very careful look

at what those labels are actually saying

and don't just assume that every health message

is all that it's cracked up to be.

Sometimes an extra dose of scepticism

can be every bit as healthy

as some of the claims that we come across,

and, of course, it can save you quite a bit of money.

But I'm afraid it's on that thought

that we have to leave you for today.

So, until the next time,

thanks very much indeed for joining us,

-and, as always, come back soon.

-Bye-bye.

-Bye-bye.

-Bye.