What is vanillin?

Recently, a sampler from the State Administration for Market Supervision and Administration found in a random inspection that a batch of 1 stage milk powder (18042NT, production date 20200603) of the internationally renowned milk powder brand Yax was found to contain vanillin, and the measured value was 171.
6μg/ kg
.
For this reason, the Shanghai Municipal Market Supervision and Administration Bureau imposed administrative penalties, confiscating the illegal income of 3.
4374729 million yuan and fined 909314058 million yuan
.


Many people are very unfamiliar with the name vanillin, and worry that there will be an incident similar to that of melamine
.
In fact, vanillin is much better than melamine
.
Vanillin is a food additive permitted by the state
.
It is widely used in foods such as cakes, ice cream, beverages, chocolate and wine
.


According to GB 2760-2014 "National Standard for the Use of Food Additives", as a synthetic spice, vanillin can be used in the 2nd stage (older infant formula) and 3rd stage (baby formula food) milk powder and some infant cereal supplements In food
.
Foods like formula milk powder have dozens of ingredients.
It is inevitable that this ingredient is bitter and that ingredient is fishy, ​​and children may not like it
.
Vanillin has a faint milky fragrance, and when added to milk powder, it can alleviate children's resistance to the "strange smell" of milk powder
.


However, in our country, one-stage milk powder (0-6 months infant formula food) is not allowed to add any edible flavors
.
The explanation given by the milk powder brand in this issue is that the production pipeline was not cleaned thoroughly when the production plant in Ireland changed the product category, which caused the vanillin contained in the milk powder produced before to be mixed into the products produced later
.


This explanation is reasonable
.
The maximum usage of vanillin in the second and third stages of milk powder in China is 5000μg/100ml and 7000μg/100ml respectively
.
In this batch of milk powder in question, converted into the same unit is about 2.
6μg/100ml
.
With such a low residual amount, the manufacturer does not need to take a huge risk of illegality and add little vanillin to the milk powder
.


This incident shows from the side that China's milk powder supervision system, whether it is for foreign big-name milk powder or domestic milk powder, is in place without discrimination
.
The regulation is the regulation.
The penalty for the brand this time has also sounded the alarm for all foreign milk powder brands
.
The safety of milk powder is not sloppy in our country .
Finally, you don’t need to panic too much about vanillin.
For example, in chocolate, the maximum amount of vanillin used is 970000μg/kg, and almost everyone will eat it
.
If you are really worried, next time you buy milk powder, you can observe the ingredient list and choose those formula milk powder that does not add vanillin
.