This Flavor Not Tested On Animals

I was unwrapping a bag of caramels in my pajamas-and-glasses bakery this morning when I noticed a note on the bottom of the bag: artificially flavored.

Vanilla caramels.

Artificially flavored.

Why?

Does it not seem easy enough to just flavor them with actual vanilla? I've made caramel before, and it's not like there are that many ingredients.

I may not be well versed in the chemical market, but it seems like much more work to come up with an artificial flavoring that tastes like vanilla than to just buy a bottle of real vanilla.

There would have to be multiple tries, of course, multiple rounds of tests and alterations, and it probably took weeks (if not months) for the company to come up with just the right artificial semblance of the flavor that they could have had from the beginning if they just used the real stuff.

I mean, this judgment may be a little harsh, because it is coming from a person who won't even be happy using the store brand vanilla; I would much rather buy Penzeys vanilla made from Madagascan beans because, to me, the flavor is worth the cost.

But still.

Harsh or not, you can't deny that the concept of creating a flavor that already exists is more than a little ridiculous.

Beside the fact that it takes much more time to artificially manufacture something instead of just using the real product, I also can't imagine that it really costs that much less.

But you know, these are corporations. They're all about saving the pennies and dimes so they can give their CEOs million dollar bonuses at the end of the year.

And, with the growing amount of things that aren't flavored with anything meant to be edible, they can now feel super special when they actually sell a naturally flavored product!

Just walking through the grocery store, it's hard not to notice how fucking proud they are of that.

Check out this breakfast sandwich, made with REAL CHEESE!!

"Seriously? Real cheese? OH MY GOD, I DIDN'T KNOW THAT EXISTED ANY MORE! THANK YOU, FROZEN FOOD GODS, FOR PROVIDING ME WITH REAL FOOD THAT IS MEANT TO BE INGESTED! YOU'RE LIKE JESUS, ONLY BETTER!"

...is definitely not what I say.

Because if real cheese was such a revelation, I wouldn't be able to walk over to the deli and buy myself a pound of it for five fucking dollars.

Yet people continue buying things that are made with nothing real, and paying more for things that act special and hike up their price because of their "REAL!" ingredients.

And we wonder why America's fat.