Questions
One question, one direct answer, in the words people actually use to ask it.
These come from what people ask Pura after a scan. The answer is at the top of each page. The reasoning is underneath it, for when you want to check the working.
A
- Are INS numbers the same as E numbers? The digits are shared. What the prefix means is not, and that difference is the whole answer.
- Are parabens bad for you? A real study, read wrongly for twenty years, and repeated by almost every page that answers this question.
- Are silicones bad for hair? A category argued about as though it were a single substance, which it is not.
- Are sugar alcohols the same as sugar? Not sugar, not alcohol, not interchangeable with each other, and the one line on the panel a manufacturer may simply leave out.
- Are supplement capsules vegetarian? The two kinds look identical and the label always distinguishes them. You just have to know which list to read.
C
D
- Does "non-dairy" mean milk-free? One of the few places where the front of a package can be technically permitted and still mislead you badly.
- Does a proprietary blend have to say how much? The rule requires more than people assume and less than they want, and knowing exactly where the line falls is the useful part.
- Does biotin make hair grow? One of the few questions on this site where a regulator has already published its opinion in plain words.
- Does curly hair need to avoid sulfates? The rule works for some routines and fails for others, and which one you are in depends on a different ingredient entirely.
- Does gluten-free mean wheat-free? The two phrases point in opposite directions, and only one of them has a number behind it.
- Does peanut oil have to be declared as an allergen? A labelling answer with a sharp edge on it: the exemption is real, and it is not the same as an answer about your allergy.
H
I
- Is allulose a sugar? One of the few cases where the chemistry and the Nutrition Facts panel give different answers, and both are correct.
- Is benzoyl peroxide used in food? A genuinely surprising overlap between the pharmacy shelf and the cheese counter, with the limits written down in both places.
- Is BHA banned in food? An ingredient on a national carcinogen list and an approved additive list at the same time, and what that combination actually tells you.
- Is calcium carbonate made from shells? A rare case where the regulation closes the origin question outright, and a supplement rule that handles the one exception properly.
- Is carmine vegan? No, and the harder part is spotting it, because on a cosmetic it rarely says carmine.
- Is casein the same as lactose? Two different parts of milk, two different reasons to avoid them, and one confusion that sends people to the wrong product.
- Is collagen the same as gelatin? One protein, three names, three degrees of breakdown, and a supplement aisle that sells the last stage at a considerable markup.
- Is colloidal oatmeal gluten-free? A question with a good answer on food and no answer at all on a cosmetic, and the reason is that one aisle has machinery the other does not.
- Is gelatin halal? The honest answer has two parts: what gelatin is made from, which is a fact, and what follows from that, which is not ours to rule on.
- Is gelatin vegetarian? No, and it surprises people because gelatin does not look or taste like an animal product.
- Is gum arabic a nut? A question that comes from a real detail in the regulation, and an answer that turns on the difference between a family tree and an immune system.
- Is healthy a regulated word on a label? The word that sounds most like marketing is the one a manufacturer actually has to qualify for.
- Is L-cysteine made from human hair? One of the few ingredient rumours with something real underneath it, and an honest account of how much.
- Is lactic acid dairy? A question the internet answers too confidently, and the line in the regulation that makes a careful answer better than a clean one.
- Is lanolin vegan? An animal ingredient with an unusually clear answer on one side and an honest disagreement on the other.
- Is lecithin always from soy? A single word on a label covering three different plants, only one of which is a major allergen.
- Is maltodextrin gluten free? One of the rare cases where the honest answer changes depending on which country printed the label.
- Is mineral oil bad for your skin? A question where the answer turns entirely on which of two very different materials you are talking about.
- Is modified food starch gluten-free? Usually yes, and the label gives you a way to check that most people do not know about.
- Is monk fruit allowed in Europe? A sweetener that is ordinary in an American supermarket and mostly absent from a European one, for reasons that are procedural rather than toxicological.
- Is polysorbate 80 vegan? A question with a probable answer and no certain one, and a clear account of why that is.
- Is potassium bromate still legal in bread? The permission does not come from where you would look for it, which is why this question is harder to answer than it should be.
- Is potassium sorbate safe? One of the most flagged preservatives on the internet, and one of the better studied ones in the food supply.
- Is Red 40 banned in Europe? A case where the popular claim is wrong and the true version is more interesting than the myth.
- Is shellac the same as beeswax? Same job, same shelf, three different origins, and a naming system that helps in exactly one case out of three.
- Is shellac vegan? No, and the difficulty is that the word shellac is often nowhere on the label.
- Is soy lecithin safe if I am allergic to soy? The reassuring answer on this site that still ends with a conversation you should have with your allergist.
- Is sulfur good for acne? One of the few acne answers where the label carries a number you can compare.
- Is talc tested for asbestos? A statutory requirement, a proposed rule, and a withdrawal, leaving the testing where it was: up to the manufacturer.
- Is the B12 in supplements vegan? The one nutrient a plant diet cannot supply, in a form that no animal supplies either.
- Is there casein in butter? A food that is nearly all fat still carries enough milk protein to matter, and which of the two dairy problems you have decides everything.
- Is tocopherol the same as vitamin E? The same nutrient under a name nobody recognises, doing a job nobody expects, with its origin hidden in two letters.
- Is vanilla flavouring the same as vanilla extract? Two labels a few centimetres apart on the same shelf, one of which a manufacturer had to qualify for.
- Is vitamin D3 vegan? One of the rare cases where the number printed beside a vitamin tells you where it came from.
- Is xanthan gum gluten free? A question with a clean chemical answer and a messier labelling one, and the difference is worth holding onto.
S
W
- What does "natural flavors" actually mean? It is a real legal term. It just does not mean what the packaging wants you to think it means.
- What does added sugars mean on a label? Two numbers, one indented under the other, answering questions most people never separate.
- What does enzymes mean on a cheese label? The single most common reason a cheese cannot be confirmed vegetarian, written into the regulation rather than hidden by anyone.
- What does fragrance mean on a label? The largest hole in an otherwise complete document, and it is one word wide.
- What does uncured bacon actually mean? A word on a packet that means close to the opposite of what a shopper reads into it, lawfully.
- What is CI 75470? You found it on a lipstick and it looks like every other code on the label. It is not.
- What is magnesium stearate doing in my supplement? The most suspected ingredient in a capsule is there so the tableting machine works.
- What is the difference between folate and folic acid? Two words used interchangeably by a regulation and treated as opposites by supplement marketing.
- What skincare can I use while pregnant? Almost everything written on this subject tells you what to put down. This is the part that says what you can pick up.
- Which cheeses have the most casein? Cheesemaking is a process for concentrating one milk protein, so the question has a structural answer rather than a list.
- Which foods contain casein? All dairy, obviously. The useful part of this list is the products that do not present themselves as dairy at all.
- Which foods contain gelatin? Not a list of everything, which would be useless. A list of the places gelatin appears where nobody thinks to look.
- Why do sugar-free sweets upset my stomach? The sentence in small print on the back of the packet is the answer, and it is there because a regulator required it.
- Why do sunscreens show a percentage when creams do not? The single most useful distinction on a personal care shelf, and it turns on what the front of the box claims.
- Why does an iron supplement have a poison warning? One of the strongest mandated sentences in food labelling, on one of the most ordinary products in the cupboard.