This is What Happens Inside Your Stomach When You Eat Instant Noodles!

Dr. Braden Kuo of Massachusetts General Hospital conducted a first-of-its-kind experiment to discover what happens in your stomach and digestive tract after you eat instant noodles (ramen noodles, to be more specific) by using a pill-sized camera. The findings were shocking…

Ramen Noodles Don’t Break Down After Hours of Digestion

The video above shows ramen noodles inside of a stomach two hours after consumption. Even then, they are still intact, unlike the homemade ramen noodles used for comparison. This is a matter of concern for several reasons.

For one thing, it puts additional pressure on your digestive system because it is made to work for hours in order to dissolve the highly processed food, which is rather ironic as most processed food lacks fiber and gets broken down quite fast.

But, when food remains in the stomach for so long, it affects the body absorption of nutrients as well. Still, in the case of processed ramen noodles, there’s very little nutrition to be absorbed, but rather, a lot of additives, including the toxic preservative tertiary-butyl hydroquinone (TBHQ).

If this additive stays in the digestive tract for so long together with the hard-to-break-down noodles, you can only assume what it can do to your health.

Five Grams of Noodle Preservative, TBHQ, Is Lethal

Although TBHQ, a byproduct of petroleum, is often referred to as “antioxidant,” it’s important to understand that it is a synthetic chemical with antioxidant properties, rather than a natural antioxidant. It’s added in many foods, ranging from crackers to crisps to fast foods, to increase shelf life by preventing oxidation of fats and oils. It is commonly found in McDonald’s chicken nuggets, Kellogg’s CHEEZ-IT crackers, Reese’s peanut butter cups, Wheat Thins crackers, Teddy Grahams, Red Baron frozen pizza, Taco Bell beans, and many more.

It is also added to varnishes, lacquers, and pesticide products, as well as cosmetics and perfumes to increase stability and decrease the evaporation rate.

At its 19th and 21st meetings, the Joint FAO/WHO Expert Committee on Food Additives decided that TBHQ was safe for human consumption at levels of 0-0.5 mg/kg of body weight.

But, the Codex commission set the maximum acceptable limits up to between 100 – 400mg/kg, depending on the food it’s added to. Thus, chewing gum is allowed to contain the highest levels of TBHQ. According to the requirements of the US Food and Drug Administration, TBHQ must not surpass 0.02% of its oil and fat content.

As there’s an apparent inconsistency in these allegedly “safe” limits, the best option is to have little or no exposure to this toxicant. According to a Consumer’s Dictionary of Food Additives exposure to five grams can be lethal and, and exposure to just one gram of TBHQ can cause:

• Delirium
• Sense of suffocation
• Nausea and vomiting
• Ringing in the ears (tinnitus)
• Collapse

Although TBHQ is not a persistent toxicant, which means your body will most likely get rid of it so that it doesn’t bioaccumulate, when you consume it through instant noodles, your body might be receiving prolonged exposures. According to the Environmental Working Group (EWG), health risks associated with TBHQ based on animal studies include:

• Liver effects at very low doses
• Positive mutation results from in vitro tests on mammalian cells
• Biochemical changes at very low doses
• Reproductive effects at high doses

Eating Instant Noodles Linked to Metabolic Syndrome