I just found out Poptarts contain gelatin. I’m devastated 😣 I’ve been a vegetarian for 6 years and I’ve definitely been eating Poptarts that whole time. Did y’all know this?
I guess it never occurred to me that they would have gelatin in them, and I never bothered to check the ingredient label until now. I checked the ingredient label of our box of Wildberry poptarts to see if they had any actual strawberry or if it’s all artificial (I’m allergic to strawberry), and noticed gelatin on the label.
I thought maybe it might just be that one flavor, so I checked the other boxes of Poptarts I have, and they all have gelation. Wildberry, Blueberry Lemon Crumble, and my favorite Chocolate.
I guess I won’t be eating Poptarts anymore. Have y’all ever found out a favorite food or snack wasn’t vegetarian like you thought? What did y’all do?
by Squidoriya
44 Comments
Gelatin is in *everything*. Medicines too. I just real all labels for gelatin now unless its something like beans or pasta.
Btw, I’m pretty sure it’s just the frosted ones that have gelatin. The non-frosted ones should be fine
Nature’s Path toaster pastries are delicious, and the frosting doesn’t have gelatin.
The ones without frosting should be okay.
When i ate poptarts the unfrosted ones were vegan friendly
Mother fucker…..
They are terrible for you, anyway.
No, only the unfrosted are vegetarian
The gelatin is in the frosting. Unfrosted should still be fine (plus much less sugary)
I’ve noticed that there are a few generic brands that are vegetarian-safe, unfortunately can’t name them off the top of my head.
Aldi own version of poptarts , is the only ones I’ve found to get nostalgic on. Tbh i seldom ate them even as a kid… but somehow i craved them last year…. then found them in aldi. A lot less colours in them too. I mean wtf is with all those additives?
PS I’m in the UK
Label reading is mandatory. That said, I still have a some cognitive dissonance with one of my main hobbies: film photography. I’m not eating the gelatin in the film emulsion so there is that but I am consuming it in a way.
Frosted mini wheats neither
i mean you could always be one of those vegetarians that only cuts out real, tangible meat 🤷
It’s the frosting, the unfrosted ones are vegan
Neither are frosted mini wheats
This one caught me out for YEARS! the slush puppy popptarts are veggie tho (:
I went vegetarian in 1989 and have literally never missed eating meat. What do I miss? Chocolate Fudge Frosted Pop Tarts. *sobs a little*
I never had poptarts, are they really so good?
This might be controversial, but I try not to worry about gelatin too much for the following reasons:
* It’s in a LOT of sources and hard to avoid, even many medicines are made with it.
* It’s usually in very small quantities.
* But my main reason is this: no animals are being killed for the gelatin. It’s a by-product of the current system, kind of like leather.
I don’t believe the small consumption of gelatin compromises the health or ethical reasons of being a vegetarian.
With that said, however, none of this applies if you’re vegetarian for religious reasons.
The unfrosted ones are free from gelatin, it’s the frosting that’s the issue.
Gelatin is unnecessarily in everything, my wife had been eating the Noosa yogurt for a while and just realized it has gelatin in it.
Unfrosted pop tarts are vegetarian. I also recently found out Totino’s cheese pizza rolls have gelatin in them, which was pretty devastating ngl
Yep I knew about this. USA food companies puts gelatin in so much random shit (yogurt is another one). Aldi’s (at least UK Aldi’s) has a great vegan poptart substitute though.
Wait until you find out about rennet….
If you can find it Brown Cow yogurt. It has pectin. Not gelatin
Yeah I’ve known, super disappointing. The knock off brands had the opportunity to make pop tarts without gelatin to win the vegetarian market, but even those use gelatin.
You can still get the kind without frosting though, it’s just the frosted ones that use gelatin.
Neither are Twinkies.
Usually made of vegetable/animal shortening that’s whipped up with sugar. “Cream-like filling”
I thought vegetarian was no actual meat and vegans are the ones that consume/use no products derivative of animals?
Bonkers, isn’t it?
It’s the frosting, like everyone else is saying. It’s in other things, too, that are similar, like Frosted Flakes, and Frosted Mini Wheats. Gotta be careful.
Hrm interesting. Pop tarts have too much sugar in them anyhow. Just another reason to avoid it.
The brown sugar cinnamon ones are!
Trader Joe’s pop tarts are vegetarian!
Some of the fancy versions of pop tarts (like what you find at Whole Foods, fresh market, Publix) are vegetarian. Definitely more pricey and not as many flavors but the basic ones are there.
Aldi do a veggie version!
Damn. I really wish they’d put Gelatin under the bold listings like it does for Wheat and Soy.
Poptarts aren’t even food.
>Have y’all ever found out a favorite food or snack wasn’t vegetarian like you thought?
McDonald’s Fries (in the US). They contain [Natural Beef Flavor](https://www.mcdonalds.com/us/en-us/product/small-french-fries.html#accordion-c921f9207b-item-283bee7dbd).
Since finding this out several years ago, I no longer assume anything is safe. There are free apps available where you can use your camera and point it at ingredient lists and it’ll highlight non-veg ingredients. This helps. But you gotta stay up on ingredient changes. It’s usually the opposite, but, like, Skittles. They used to contain gelatin but several years ago I discovered I could eat them again!
There’s other brands that make vegetarian ones, Nature’s Path and Trader Joe’s
Yeah pop tarts was a hard one for me too 😔 I once ate an entire box of lucky charms until I realized I was eating marshmallows and there was obviously gelatin in it, not my proudest moment
Gelatin is downright disgusting.
Watch for the carmine too. That isn’t vegetarian either.
Gelatin, lard, suet, red food colouring (the one made from beetles), anchovies, some “natural flavourings”, fish sauce, animal rennet, random meat broths in veg soups… There are always sneaky things in commercial or restaurant foods. Always bears reading the labels and asking the questions that align with your ethics/dietary needs/religious rules.
Pie crusts got me a few times, salad dressing and juice with the red bug dye, tomato soup with beef broth, pea soup with lard…
Just do your best and don’t beat yourself up for something you didn’t ask for and didn’t know was there.
There are other brands that don’t contain gelatin, but I’m not sure what they are anymore. Trader Joe’s used to have their “Toaster Pastries” available and people mentioned them this year and someone is selling them on Amazon, but I can’t find any information on them currently in the stores.
Whole Foods appears to carry Nature’s Path toaster pastries:
[https://www.wholefoodsmarket.com/product/natures-path-organic-berry-strawberry-frosted-toaster-pastries-11-oz-b000vk66g6](https://www.wholefoodsmarket.com/product/natures-path-organic-berry-strawberry-frosted-toaster-pastries-11-oz-b000vk66g6)
For future consideration, you might be best to avoid the “big name” brands as they are owned by mega-conglomerates that don’t care about you.
Unilever (Ben & Jerry’s, Breyers, Klondike, Good Humor, Hellmann’s, Dove, Seventh Generation, Vaseline) is especially bad.
The bought Country Crock, then around 2015 made a “new better tasting” product that added more water and suddenly trying to make a grilled cheese made the bread stick to the pan. Some other conglomerate now owns Country Crock now. They also completely destroyed the legacy of Breyers, which used to be the best ice cream, by replacing all the ingredients with garbage so much that it could no longer be labelled as “ice cream” and instead became “frozen dairy dessert.”
I pretty much do all my shopping at Trader Joe’s now, they have tons of vegetarians and vegan products, and they are cheap!
You gotta check EVERY label! They sneak gelatin and other weird meat products in to foods you’d never expect 😭😭😭 I remember when I found out about pop tarts and was also devastated. I’ve had some good non gelatin pastries that are lil pop tarts though. They do exist 🙂