Speaker 1: Welcome to Brainstuff, a production of iHeartRadio. Hey brain Stuff,
Speaker 1: Lauren Vogel Bomb here with another classic episode for you.
Speaker 1: This one is about one of my favorite food topics
Speaker 1: and one we've talked about in a couple other episodes,
Speaker 1: the flavor of butter, and relatedly, how that nine irresistible
Speaker 1: popcorn sold in movie theaters can taste so buttery while
Speaker 1: containing zero butter. Hey brain Stuff, I'm Lauren vogel Bomb,
Speaker 1: and it's time we talked about movie theater popcorn, that
Speaker 1: salty siren of the cinema. You come without nutrition labels
Speaker 1: and sizes that defy sensibility. We consume you in the dark.
Speaker 1: You're inadvertently vegan and gluten free, but that still doesn't
Speaker 1: mean you're good for us. So what the heck are
Speaker 1: you made of anyway?
Speaker 2: Meat? Movie theater popcorns two main ingredients after poppedcorn, of course,
Speaker 2: flavorcle and butter flavored topping. Let's break those down. Flavocol
Speaker 2: is a proprietary seasoned powder that goes on the corn
Speaker 2: before it's popped. It contains only four ingredients, superfine salt,
Speaker 2: artificial flavor, and two synthetic yellow dyes that help give
Speaker 2: the popcorn its violently yellow, butteryish color. A butter can
Speaker 2: naturally be yellow because of a pigment and vitamin called
Speaker 2: beta carotene that's found in the fresh grass that dairy
Speaker 2: cows are sometimes fed, or butter can be dyed that
Speaker 2: color when cows are fat other things. Flavocol has zero
Speaker 2: calories and zero fat, carbs, and protein, but being mostly salt,
Speaker 2: it packs a wallup in the sodium department. One teaspoon
Speaker 2: contains one hundred and sixteen percent of your recommended daily
Speaker 2: intake of sodium based on the average two thousand calorie
Speaker 2: per day diet, and depending on the recipe and the
Speaker 2: machine being used, you'd get about a third of a
Speaker 2: teaspoon in a small popcorn, So heads up if you're
Speaker 2: monitoring your sodium consumption. Next up that butter flavored topping,
Speaker 2: which is what gets squirted out in pumps if you
Speaker 2: ask for it. Warning betrayal alert. It doesn't have any
Speaker 2: butter in it at all. What it does contain is
Speaker 2: partially hydrogenated soybean oil, which is a trans fat that
Speaker 2: falls into the category of bad fat. These types of
Speaker 2: fats have been linked to heart disease and other cardiovascular problems.
Speaker 2: The topping also has some beta carotene that pigment I
Speaker 2: just mentioned. Beta carotene helps add to the buttery color
Speaker 2: and can, by the way, either be naturally derived from
Speaker 2: plants or made in a lab. That's the difference between
Speaker 2: it being labeled a natural versus an artificial color. The
Speaker 2: topping also has tertiary buttle hydroquinone or TBHQ, which is
Speaker 2: a synthetic preservative that keeps oils from becoming rancid as
Speaker 2: they sit, and polydimethyl silazane or PDMS, which is a
Speaker 2: silicone based chemical that prevents foaming in hot oil. It's
Speaker 2: also been preliminarily shown to help hair cells grow when
Speaker 2: applied topically, but that's a different episode. Don't rub butter
Speaker 2: flavored topping on your scalp. The final ingredient the one
Speaker 2: that gives movie theater popcorn. It's irresistible taste. Buttery flavoring,
Speaker 2: a one hundred percent non dairy mystery chemical that mimics
Speaker 2: the taste of butter. This and the artificial flavoring and
Speaker 2: flavorcoll are industry secrets, but they're probably one of a
Speaker 2: few lab synthesized molecules that taste and smell like butter
Speaker 2: diacetyl acitoin sethyl propianal or similar. Those first two that
Speaker 2: I mentioned are compounds that are naturally created in old
Speaker 2: fashioned cultured butter by the friendly lactic acid bacteria that
Speaker 2: helps solidify cream into butter. Butter flavor is basically a
Speaker 2: tasty byproduct, sort of like with beta carotene. These compounds
Speaker 2: can be naturally derived from farmed bacteria or synthesized in
Speaker 2: a lab. They'll make that butter flavored topping taste almost
Speaker 2: like the real thing. The real slap in the face, though,
Speaker 2: is that movie theater butter flavored topping has twenty more
Speaker 2: calories per tablespoon than real butter. So if you are
Speaker 2: a large bucket of plane popcorn is about one thousand
Speaker 2: calories with just the flavor call seasoning on it, and
Speaker 2: you choose to add a minimum of three tablespoons of
Speaker 2: buttery topping, or as much as six if you opt
Speaker 2: for a squirt in the middle and a scort on
Speaker 2: the top, the large bucket you gnash on while watching
Speaker 2: the latest blockbuster could be more than two thousand calories.
Speaker 2: It definitely means that movie theater popcorn is a treat
Speaker 2: everything in moderation. Oh and a side note about diacetyl,
Speaker 2: one of those butter flavor compounds. You may have heard
Speaker 2: that it causes health problems. That is a real thing,
Speaker 2: but the story got sort of sensationalized. Factory workers who
Speaker 2: breathe in a whole lot of diacetyl do have an
Speaker 2: increased risk of a particular type of lung disease, and
Speaker 2: one guy who was popping two to three bags per
Speaker 2: day for a number of years successfully sued a bunch
Speaker 2: of microwave popcorn producers after contracting that disease. But there's
Speaker 2: no known risk in eating this artificial flavor or in
Speaker 2: breathing in the amount you'd realize from popping a bag
Speaker 2: of popcorn in your microwave every now and then, And
Speaker 2: the Flavor Call brand has come out as being diacetyle free.
Speaker 2: Good news for movie theater popcorn. Do watch out for
Speaker 2: it as an ingredient in vape liquid.
Speaker 1: Though today's episode is based on the article what the
Speaker 1: heck is in Movie theater Popcorn on how Stuffworks dot com,
Speaker 1: written by Kerry tatrou Brain Stuff is production of iHeartRadio
Speaker 1: in partnership with how stuffworks dot com and is produced
Speaker 1: by Tyler Klin. Four more podcasts My Heart Radio, visit
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