The Wild Wild Wild West of School Lunches: Eggs For Breakfast?

The school breakfast menu read something like this:scrambled eggs, toast, milk, apple sauce. That sounded like a reasonable breakfast. Protein, grain and juice. What could be wrong with that?

I found the box that had contained the "scrambled eggs" and of course I squirreled it away and back up to my office. On the cover of box was a picture of a bucolic farm setting reminiscent of Old MacDonald's farm. It made one think that the eggs in my meal might have been gathered by sturdy and robust children before being brought lovingly to the school.

This intrepid label reader found the following in your child's "eggs"

 whole eggs, egg whites, whey, skim milk, soybean oil, salt, xanthan gum, citric acid, .15% water  as a carrier for citric acid

64% cholesterol
10% fat
16% sodium 380 milligrams
2 grams sugar
11 grams protein
1% carbohydrates


This is in a 1/2 cup serving. How many kids do you think will only take 1/2 cup? The ingredient list starts out harmlessly. Egg, eggs, milk, soybean oil (not great but ok, although most likely that oil comes from genetically modified soy beans), salt, and then that mysterious stuff known as xanthan gum. Xanthan gum is strange looking gooey substance that is formed from three "corn sugars." To make things simple xanthan gum is a derivative of corn syrup.

"Caloric availability and digestibility studies indicated that xanthan gum is not utilized by the body. This conclusion was substantiated by the finding that practically all of the gum fed during a & -day period could be accounted for in the feces." (Booth et al.,1963)

Deciphering nearly 50 years of research tells me that xanthan gum is not actually food. The body does not recognize this and many other synthetic corn derivatives as food! Which leads to the next question. If it's not food, then what is it doing in our food?

"Side effects of xantham gum include excessive gas production and bloating. Exposure to the powder may cause lung and breathing problems along with flu-like symptoms"."

• Nicotine Side Effects
• Guar Gum Uses

Another figure caught my eye under the "nutrition facts" breakdown. One "serving" of eggs contains 64% of the FDA's maximum cholesterol allowance for one one day. Leaving aside the reality that most students take far more than 1/2 cup of eggs, I could not help but notice that lunch that day included grilled cheese sandwiches. So by even the most conservative estimates, students were getting 150-200% percent of their maximum cholesterol allowance fromtheir school breakfast and lunch. The cholesterol figure was so high that I completely forgot about the salt and sugar injection the kids were getting with their eggs.

"Nothing but the facts ma'am"