Can you taste the iron in Wheat Chex?
Years ago I noticed a strange taste in Wheat Chex. The only thing that I could think of to call the taste was, ‘of iron.’ Recently (for some reason I never checked back then) I looked at the nutrition information while snacking on it. Oddly enough, it has 80% daily value of iron in one serving (1cup). That is a lot. no? Though, I can taste the iron in a single square.
It is the holidays & so I presume some of you Jellies have Wheat Chex on hand for making Chex Mix. Would you mind eating a couple squares (from the box, not after being seasoned & baked) & telling me if you taste something that could only be described as, ‘iron’? Thanks.
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Yes I can, along with the B-Vitamins, etc. If you look at the ingredients it’s as if they dumped a truckload of vitamins into the batch, so they can make their claims. I personally would like to have a cereal without vitamins, if I feel I need vitamins, I will take a quality multi-vitamin. I guess they feel they must feed the masses that are nutritionally deficient, which brings up another question.
I would rather have a grain that is exceptional, high in nutrients without artificial sugars. I guess that’s what oat meal is all about.
80% of your daily intake of iron is about 14 thousandths of a gram (not a lot). The content of a single square has to be in the range of a couple hundred-thousandths of a gram in each square. I think that you are tasting something other than iron. I have not been able to find any information on the ability of people to taste iron, because there are a whole bunch of health problems that cause a metallic taste, so that is what all of the Google results are about.
I am a machinist. I know what iron tastes like. As well as steel, Inconel, aluminum, and titanium. Believe me, it isn’t the Wheat Chex.
I don’t taste iron (though I do sometimes get a ‘metallic’ taste from some foods), but I can taste trace amounts of several other things, even when they’re used in tiny amounts and basically hidden in the food. If a speck of green pepper was ever on my slice of pizza, I can taste it, even if it was removed before I ever knew it was there. Other flavors I can always taste include vinegar and alcohol.
I’m a supertaster, and I think it’s possible that supertasters can pick up different tastes, so maybe you’re one, too?
I love Wheat Chex. I had never thought of it tasting like iron, but now that you say it maybe so? Getting 80% of the RDA value is not a big deal thiugh. The RDA values are to avoid serious dificiency, basically a minimum amount recommended, it is not a maximum amount to ingest during the day.
That is the basis of a classic kid’s science experiment: take a bunch of cereal, mush it up in water, use a magnet to drag out the iron particles. Iron particles are used as the iron supplement. Yes, real metallic iron! Yum.
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