Food products almost equal to toxins

[snopes]

Comment: I once was told that Dr Pepper was one chemical away from being
antifreeze. I don't beleieve this, but would like to know how this got
started.

[Singing in the Drizzle]

I would not supprize me in the least if it was true. Take salt for example. It is one chemical away from being a posion. Then again by desolving anything in water raises the freezing temperature of water and could be called antifreeze. The trick is to do it without damaging the engine.

I've always heard if a beetroot was converted to e-numbers it would be illegal to sell it as it has too many poisonous elements.

[DaGuyWitBluGlasses]

Propylene glycol is found in foods, (extracts are one thing that comes to mind). Not found in Dr. Pepper though. (Propylene glycol itself can be sold as a type of antifreeze, though antifreeze is usually considered to be Ethylene Glycol)

Benzoic Acid is used to make Sodium Benzoate (Found in Dr. Pepper)
and can also is used to make some glycol compounds, but those would be to soften plastics, and not used as antifreeze.

[Nana M]

This is what happens when people who don't understand chemical structure are allowed to use computers

[Mizu]

I heard this rumor before, but it was Mountain Dew, not Dr Pepper stated.

This almost became a chemistry experiment for me, but I did something else instead.

[lynnejanet]

I don't believe the Dr. Pepper story, but some foods can be toxic to some people. Wheat gluten is a toxin in my body, as it is for my dad, and both my sons. It's not an allergy - the wheat gluten literally poisons us.

[Amigone201]

Water is H20. It's completely harmless. Add another hydrogen, and you have H2O2, hydrogen peroxide.

I guess we'd better avoid water then, lest it come into contact with hydrogen and poison us.

[snopes]

Originally Posted by Amigone201

Water is H20. It's completely harmless. Add another hydrogen, and you have H2O2, hydrogen peroxide.

Wouldn't you have hydrogen trioxide (or hydrozone)?

- snopes

[Thebobo]

Originally Posted by Nana M

This is what happens when people who don't understand chemical structure are allowed to use computers

Well that would be a lot of us. Thanks to other snopesters I now know that American cheese could be a molecule away from plastic but in the world of chemical structure this is quite normal.

[Amigone201]

Originally Posted by snopes

Wouldn't you have hydrogen trioxide (or hydrozone)?

- snopes

You're right. I mistyped. It's add another oxygen.

[Alchemy]

Originally Posted by snopes

Comment: I once was told that Dr Pepper was one chemical away from being antifreeze. I don't beleieve this, but would like to know how this got started.

I'm not sure how you can even parse this question since Dr Pepper (or practically any food or beverage product) contains numerous discrete ingredients, each of which consist of one, several, or an innumberable number of chemicals, and I don't see any meaning in the claim that a chemical or collection of chemicals is "one chemical away" from another chemical.

Originally Posted by DaGuyWitBluGlasses

Propylene glycol is found in foods, (extracts are one thing that comes to mind). Not found in Dr. Pepper though. (Propylene glycol itself can be sold as a type of antifreeze, though antifreeze is usually considered to be Ethylene Glycol)

Most frozen foods contain modified corn starches, as many natural starches don't respond well to a freeze/reheat cycle, making frozen foods lumpy, oily, rubbery, or just plain stale when you reheat them. Food starches are usually modified with propylene oxide, which may leave trace amounts of glycols. (I think.) Propylene glycol is also used as a solvent, and thus whatever your extracts would be dissolved in.

Animal-safe antifreeze using propylene glycol instead of ethylene glycol is somewhat common. (Though it's still not good to drink, removing all the ethylene glycol makes it much less toxic.)

Originally Posted by snopes

Wouldn't you have hydrogen trioxide (or hydrozone)?

H₃O⁺ would be a hydronium atom, which is a useful illustration of acid behavior in water and may or may not actually exist in a useful physical sense.

[Tenko]

Is it just me or is one chemical away really vague? I mean, isn't any substance with a stable form a chemical? If the one chemical I add to Dr. Pepper is arsenic, that would make it poisonous all right.

[snopes]

Comment: heard that Pam spray is 1 molecule away from plastic and is
therefore dangerous??

[Nana M]

Someone didn't take any chemistry in school.

[Deepfrydegg]

Rather than spout off my college years of Chemistry (classroom, not social), I will rather ask "one molecule" of what?

[glass papaya]

Move it two molecules to the left. Then you'll be safe.

[BringTheNoise]

Originally Posted by Deepfrydegg

Rather than spout off my college years of Chemistry (classroom, not social), I will rather ask "one molecule" of what?

One molecule... OF DOOM!

Or possibly ignorance. Either/or really.

Originally Posted by snopes

Comment: I once was told that Dr Pepper was one chemical away from being
antifreeze. I don't beleieve this, but would like to know how this got
started.

I worked for Dr Pepper in the '80's, and it did contain propylene gylcol as a flavor stabilizer. Propylene glycol is used in antifreeze and de-icing solutions, but is considered non-toxic.

As with any antifreeze, it also demonstrates a sweet taste, which allowed Dr Pepper to use less cane sugar in the formula.

Since Dr Pepper has a combination of natural and artificial flavors, proplyene glycol was used to ensure that the flavor would not change if the product was frozen.

But because proplylene gylcol is also used in antifreeze, it was determined at a high-level marketing meeting in 1986 between Dr Pepper management and their advertising agency, that the potential liability of the public connecting their product to antifreeze would be catastrophic.

About that time, the Dr Pepper formula was changed to incorporate less-expensive high fructose corn syrup instead of cane sugar.

When that re-formulation took place, the propylene glycol was deleted.