Nutrition Diva

Acrylamide in food: Should you be worried?

Episode Summary

Monica revisits acrylamide, a potential carcinogen found in foods like coffee, cereal, and French fries. Learn how it forms, the risks involved, and simple tips to minimize your exposure without giving up your favorite foods.

Episode Notes

 Is there a carcinogen lurking in your corn flakes?

References: 

A Review of Dietary Intake of Acrylamide in Humans - PMC (nih.gov)

Acrylamide Intake through Diet and Human Cancer Risk - PMC

Episode Transcription

Welcome to the Nutrition Diva podcast, a show where we take a closer look at the latest nutrition news, research, and trends so that you can make more informed choices and feel more confident about what you eat. I’m your host, Monica Reinagel and as you listen to this episode, I will be in Minneapolis, MN for the annual Food and Nutrition Conference, the largest gathering of nutrition professionals in North America.  (We’ll just have to hope that no nutrition emergencies break out while we are all out of town!)

And in today’s episode, we’re talking about acrylamide.  About 15 years ago, nutrition scientists announced some new guidelines for how much acrylamide you can safely consume. At the time, most people had never even heard of acrylamide, much less realized they were supposed to be worried about it!  And so, back in 2010 I did an episode on the subject, just to help people put the concerns into perspective 

Last week, I happened to get emails from two different listeners both asking about acrylamide, so I thought it was time to revisit the topic on the podcast and bring you up to date with what’s gone on since my original episode. 

Acrylamide is an industrial chemical used in waste-water treatment, paper and fabric manufacture, and chemistry labs. Anyone who uses acrylamide knows that it needs to be handled with great care. If ingested or inhaled in sufficient quantities, this stuff can cause nerve damage. It's also been shown to cause cancer in animals.

So, you can imagine everyone's concern when it was discovered that many common food products, including cereal, coffee, French fries, and baked goods, contain acrylamide. You won't find it listed on the ingredient list because acrylamide isn't being added to these foods. But it turns out that small amounts of acrylamide form naturally when certain kinds of foods are roasted, toasted, baked, or fried. Specifically, acrylamide is formed through a chemical reaction between sugar and the amino acid arginine.. 

Starchy foods like potatoes and grains have the greatest potential for acrylamide production. In other words, humans have been consuming acrylamide for millennia—since they learned to roast potatoes over a fire. When it comes to more modern cooking methods, boiling, steaming, and microwaving don't cause acrylamide formation, but baking, roasting, grilling, and frying do. And the higher the temperature and the longer the cooking times, the more acrylamide is likely to be formed.

Now, I have to tell you that this was bad news for me, personally. I don't eat a lot of French fries or potato chips. But I love roasted vegetables, especially when they're deeply caramelized. I like my toast on the darker side too. And come December, when it's time for my annual sugar cookie, I'll be scanning the plate, looking for one that got left in the oven just a little too long. That extra-brown cookie is going to be higher in acrylamide than its paler neighbor. 

But the biggest primary sources of acrylamide in the typical modern diet is not burned toast or roasted vegetables. The primary sources are ready-to-eat cereal, French fries, potato chips, and coffee. 

Yes! Coffee! But don’t panic. Although roasted coffee beans contain relatively high levels of acrylamide, much of it is lost during brewing. 

So, how big a danger does acrylamide pose? It all depends on how much you’re taking in.  Here in the US, average intakes are 22 to 45 mcg per day for adults, which, according to toxicologists, is well below the threshold of safety. But typical intakes across different regions of the world vary hugely. In New Zealand and United Arab Emirates, typical intakes ranged from 75 to 150 mcg a day for an average sized adult. Spain and China had the lowest average intakes, about 15-20 mcg per day for an adult.  

When adjusted for their smaller body size, intake among children ends up being 2-3 times higher. Finally, it obviously depends on your diet. If you don't eat a lot of French fries and potato chips, you're probably getting much less than the average.

Since the potential dangers of excessive acrylamide exposure from food has become more widely recognized, the European Commission has established acceptable levels for acrylamide in various food categories.  In the United States, the FDA has not yet set regulatory limits, but in 2013, they released an action plan to reduce acrylamide in food, focusing on education and voluntary industry efforts. 

In response to these initiatives, many food manufacturers have made significant progress in reducing acrylamide levels, particularly in potato chips and crackers. They’ve achieved this by selecting potato varieties with lower sugar content, adjusting processing temperatures and times, and using enzymes to break down acrylamide precursors. Some companies have reported reductions of up to 90% in certain products!

I’m not saying that acrylamide is nothing to worry about. But I think we need to put the threat in perspective. Here’s my assessment of the risk.  If you’re eating a reasonably healthy, balanced diet, including lots of fresh vegetables and other whole foods, I think that acrylamide probably poses a pretty minimal risk to your well-being. If, on the other hand, you live on French fries, potato chips, and crackers, your acrylamide intake may be closer to the danger zone—but, honestly, that may be the least of your worries.

I'm not going to stop eating roasted vegetables or drinking coffee, because I think the benefits of these foods clearly outweigh the small risks. I will continue to limit my intake of French fries, potato chips, and sugar cookies, and not primarily because of their acrylamide content. But limiting my intake of these types of foods also helps keep my acrylamide intake low (and hopefully  makes up for that extra-dark sugar cookie).

That said, we may not all have the same threshold for risk. To some people, even a very low risk of harm is unacceptable.  If you're concerned about acrylamide, I suggest focusing on the changes that will have the biggest impact on your intake. By far, the biggest things you can do to reduce your exposure are:

  1. Don't eat a lot of French fries or potato chips. This is good advice, no matter which way you cut it.
  2. Don't eat burned or darkly-browned toast or baked goods. Toasting bread to a light golden color rather than dark brown to significantly reduce acrylamide levels. (Obviously, the more often you eat toast or baked goods, the more this matters.)
  3. Moms, skip the teething biscuits. The amount of acrylamide in teething biscuits is moderate but when you consider how small babies are and the fact that children tend to be more vulnerable to these sorts of toxins, I think it makes more sense to avoid them. Try a piece of frozen bagel (untoasted), instead.
  4. If you are roasting, frying, or air-frying potatoes, soak cut pieces in water before cooking to reduce acrylamide formation.
  5. Don't smoke or breathe second-hand smoke. Cigarette smoke is the primary non-food source of acrylamide.

If you have a question you'd like me to answer, you can email me at nutrition@quickanddirtytips.com You can also leave me a message at 443-961-6206

Nutrition Diva is a Quick and Dirty Tips podcast. Our team includes Brannan Goetschius, Nathan Semes, Davina Tomlin, Holly Hutchings, and Morgan Christianson.

That's all for this episode. Thanks for listening! I'll see you next week.