Hot take: I'm fine with 'natural flavors' on the label

At the store yesterday, I had to pick between two chicken broths. One said 'made with real chicken' and cost $4. The other just said 'natural flavors' and was $2. I got the cheaper one. I looked it up later, and 'natural flavors' can still come from real food, just processed. It tasted just as good in my soup. Why do people get so mad about this term?

3 comments

3 Comments

shaneb161mo ago

Buddy of mine swore he could taste the difference between store brand broth and homemade. One Thanksgiving he brought over this soup he'd been bragging about for a week. Turned out he accidentally grabbed the cheap carton with natural flavors instead of the fancy one. Nobody said a word, we all just ate it and said it was great. He still talks about that soup like it was the best thing he ever made. Tells you everything about how much of it is in our heads.

the_rose1mo ago

My grandma used to make her own broth from the turkey carcass after Thanksgiving. It simmered for two days with celery ends and onion skins. The whole house smelled amazing. Honestly, the canned stuff I buy now, even the fancy kind, never comes close to that memory. Maybe the anger isn't about the label, but about losing that direct link to how things are really made. Do you have a food memory that changed how you shop?

sullivan.finley1mo ago

Grandma's broth story hits hard because it's about more than just soup. We've outsourced so much of that basic, hands-on making to factories and stores. My mom would can peaches from our tree every summer, and now I just grab a plastic tub from the cold aisle. The stuff tastes fine, but the whole act of doing it, the waiting and the mess, that's what's gone missing. It makes buying things feel a little hollow sometimes, like we're just getting the end product without any of the story.