Mars Barred (groan*)
As well as Nestle, the Odeon and Patrick Moore, I can now add the Mars company to my list of boycotts.
Mars, who have been on previously iffy grounds for having some products which were suitable for vegetarians, and some that weren't** without indicating which were which, have decided to make *all* their chocolates meaty.
Mars - who seem to think they should be lauded for being "honest" (and there I thought companies were legally obliged to list their ingredients) - are under the impression that "a less strict vegetarian should enjoy our chocolate."
I do hate to break it to them, but someone who enjoys eating meaty chocolates isn't a vegetarian.
* Yes yes I know, it's dreadful, but seriously - it had to be done.
** And on even more iffy grounds, the non-vegetarian products were also not Halal.
Mars, who have been on previously iffy grounds for having some products which were suitable for vegetarians, and some that weren't** without indicating which were which, have decided to make *all* their chocolates meaty.
Mars - who seem to think they should be lauded for being "honest" (and there I thought companies were legally obliged to list their ingredients) - are under the impression that "a less strict vegetarian should enjoy our chocolate."
I do hate to break it to them, but someone who enjoys eating meaty chocolates isn't a vegetarian.
* Yes yes I know, it's dreadful, but seriously - it had to be done.
** And on even more iffy grounds, the non-vegetarian products were also not Halal.
posted by DMK @ 10:40 PM
4 Comments:
At 3:08 PM,
Anonymous said…
As a meat eater who also enjoys vegetables, I really am not sure that I want chocolate and sweets not to be suitable for vegetarians either.
What are they putting in my chocolate???
At 10:55 PM,
DMK said…
The whey powder that they use (presumably in the 'milk' part of the milk chocolate) is made with non-vegetarian rennet. Rennet is made from calves' stomaches and is used to make cheese curdle (which is why a lot of cheese is non-vegetarian too).
It used to be that if the chocolate was made in the UK it had whey made from vegetarian rennet in it, if it was made in on the European continent it had non-veggie rennet in it. You could only tell by looking at the code before the 'best before' date - if it had a 'U' then it was made in the UK.
Now it's a lot easier to tell whether it's veggie or not... It just isn't.
At 9:00 PM,
Anonymous said…
I see mars has backed down now. Apparently their complaints line was blocked completely for a couple of days. So they have seen good business sense and decided not to alienate a few million customers!
At 10:49 PM,
DMK said…
Only on the stuff that used to be vegetarian - we're still waiting on confirmation whether the stuff that always had secret-meat in it is vegetarian now or not (e.g. Twixes). It wouldn't surprise me if they're going to sneakily keep on doing that and not labelling it, counting on the fact that there's all this publicity about their 'u-turn' to make people think *everything* is OK to eat.
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