Has this happened to you?

I picked up some hummus at the grocery store the other day of a brand I had not yet tried. It was the grocer’s brand, Giant Eagle Market District. As I do instinctively with every item I pick up, I read the ingredients. “Cultured dextrose” appeared at the end of the list.

Dextrose is basically glucose (sugar) derived from plant starches. Personally, I’m not a fan of processed food additives like this, but I suppose, technically, it’s vegan-friendly. But, the “cultured” part of this is what really stood out.

So what is cultured dextrose?

A quick search on my phone revealed cultured dextrose to be a bit of a mystery. Preliminary results told me that it is dextrose that has been fermented using bacteria, and is used in the food industry as a “natural” preservative. I also noticed it is typically mentioned alongside things like “cultured skim milk.”

This search appeared to require some time. Needless to say, I wasn’t going to embark on any internet researching at the grocer, so I passed that hummus up.

Later, I investigated more. I found out that cultured dextrose is manufactured by Danisco under the name MicroGard, as a “patented natural, clean-label range for shelf life protection,” a.k.a.- a preservative. Some MicroGard products are skim milk based, some are dextrose based, but both bases are fermented using a dairy-based culture known as P. freudenreichii.

Note: See fda.govand inspection.gc.ca, for more information regarding this particular strain of bacteria.