FOOD & DRINK
We all love adding extra ingredients to what we eat, drink, use or make until it is “just right” like Goldilocks’ porridge. Adding milk and sugar to coffee? Fine, whatever tickles your taste buds. How about spices like turmeric for colour and quirkiness, ginger to perk up your coffee to new levels of exotic, probiotic powder to cause your gut flora to grow like weeds and Vitamin D because you obviously don’t get out in the sun much, hanging around those dingy coffee shops. Then there are artificial food additives like trans-fats for extra shelf life and a far better chance of heart disease and strokes, MSG for top to tail irritation and artificial sweeteners for off the scale sweetness and even higher blood glucose levels. And don’t forget the mysterious “anti-caking agents” in food. Who do these agents work for? Who are they spying on? Why are they so opposed to cakes? ①
Of course, additives include more than just food additives to provoke your palate and to give you an itch to scratch.
BUILDING MATERIALS
What about building materials? Somehow, somewhere, someone thought about adding used coffee grounds to concrete and voila! …. they found this naturally grown additive makes concrete 30% stronger than normal ! ②
So far, no testing has been done on the how different types of coffee beans affect concrete strength. Steaming hot favourite must surely be Robusta beans. It stands to reason, doesn’t it? Robusta beans must be more, well, robust than others, and so they must make stronger concrete.
Thinking laterally and wanting to jump onto the coffee and concrete bandwagon, another research group at Contrarian University has tried to reverse the process by adding cement to coffee and personally testing the outcomes.
So far, the researchers have not said a word about their results and remained tight lipped about everything. They are apparently unable to answer any questions at all.
GASOLINE
Gasoline additives are still popular with drivers of petrol-powered cars. Additives may produce extra grunt, stronger torque, deeper barks and higher pitched squeals in their engines.
Many of these additives are derived from ether, once used in hospital surgery as an anaesthetic. “TAME” is an ether additive which smells just like hospital ether, yet it does not cause the engine to become comatose. Quite the opposite. ③
Another ether compound, Diethyl Ether, (possibly developed by sisters Di and Ethyl Ether in 1906), is a volatile additive used in a number of products. For instance, it is used in making smokeless gunpowder and perfumes. ④
So if you happen to see an unstable looking person walking down your street, letting off fireworks without any smoke appearing, and smelling like Dapper Dan hair gel, you can thank ether additives.
STOCK FEED
Additives turn up in everything, including in stock feed. Unadulterated grass, hay and cereals are no longer optimal for cows. They need additives to walk faster, moo louder and emit less methane by belching less. The best additive for cows, as decided at the recent cow feed referendum, is red seaweed.⑤
Surely everyone can agree that less belching from cows (and train commuters) is a good thing. It produces better air quality, better mannered cows, and a greater possibility of peace in the mooing war between the Angus and Hereford cow nations.
TOILET TANK ADDITIVES
One should never underestimate where an additive may be useful. For instance, one of my local stores advertises Brand X “Toilet Bottom Tank Additive” in one litre bottles for “your portable toilet bottom freshwater tank”. It claims to “reduce gas buildup, eliminate unpleasant smells but remain septic safe”.⑥
If I had a portable toilet bottom (tank), I’d probably be thankful for this particular additive, but I don’t, so I won’t be adding this additive to my non-adventurous life.
CONCLUSION
I’m not sure why, but this kaleidoscopic discussion of additives has turned me a bit poetic. So I would like to add a final piece of doggerel in my homage to additives.
Additives, Additives, Helping Hurting Additives
Sweet additives, sour additives, in the food we eat.
Some say they’re unhealthy, most say they’re a treat.
Coarse additives, fine additives, add to concrete too.
Coffee grounds will make it strong, till it’s one tough brew.
Seaweed additives, garlic additives, both are good for cows.
Cutting down on methane, we just don’t know how.
Additives for petrol, additives galore.
If your engine is too slow, they will make it roar.
One additive, two additives, why not three or four?
They will solve your problems, let’s add more and more and more and more and more and more!
++++
© Geoff Milton 2023
① Wikipedia “Anti Caking Agent”
② AnthropoceneMagazine.org “Stronger Concrete”.
③ Wikipedia “Tert-Amyl Methyl Ether”
④ Wikipedia “Perfume”
⑤ Search “Clear UC Davis cattle feed additive”
⑥ Search “Bigw toilet additive”
