You Buy Counterfeit Foods All the Time: 8 Fake Foods You Love To Eat
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Counterfeit foods are a real thing, a growing concern, and many unsuspecting consumers inadvertently purchase them. The global food industry uses psychological warfare, deceptive practices, and dazzling marketing techniques to sell fake foods, also known as counterfeit foods.
Wasabi is extremely rare but is easily found in gas station sushi meals. Have you ever wondered why Kobe beef, which is also very rare, is now commonly found in fast-food burgers? Parmesan cheese is an Italian state product that is only made in Italy. So, what exactly is in your $3, green, plastic Parmesan cheese bottle?
The truth is that consumers are also culpable, wittingly or otherwise, for the counterfeit food crisis. Consumers sometimes believe what they want to believe to get the products they want, especially if they are trendy. Here are 10 counterfeit foods you should reconsider buying.
Spices
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Ground spices can be adulterated with cheap fillers, including sawdust, cellulose, or other powders. Expensive spice products are sometimes just cheap spices with an expensive label on them. Sometimes the gourmet spices you buy are adulterated with powdered twigs, flower stems, and other natural fillers. Your best option to avoid counterfeit foods in this case is to buy whole spices and grind them yourself.
Kobe Beef
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Kobe beef, which comes from the Wagyu species, only comes from certain regions in Japan. This protein is rare and strict international laws dictate the marketing of 100% real Japanese Kobe beef. Some American cattle are crossbred with authentic Kobe cattle to justify marketing fast food hamburgers or steaks as “Kobe,” or “Wagyu,”, but they are still counterfeit foods. There are only a few dozen restaurants in the United States that are legally certified and registered to serve Kobe beef.
Wasabi
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Wasabi is the stem of a Japanese plant that is only found in Japan, and it is rare even there. It is slowly pulverized and grated to become a spicy paste. It loses its potency rapidly and must be eaten 15 minutes after grating. There isn’t enough Wasabi to accommodate the sushi restaurants in the world.
About 99.99% of the wasabi products you’ve ever bought or consumed in a restaurant were counterfeit foods. Most consumer-grade wasabi is just a green-colored mix of ultra-spicy mustard and horseradish.
Parmesan Cheese
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You’ve probably never eaten real Parmesan cheese in your life. Real Parmesan cheese is an Italian state product that is only produced in Parma and other regions in Italy. 100 pounds of milk has to be processed to make 8 pounds of Parmesan. It takes at least a year to age, but usually longer. It is one of the most profitable counterfeit foods in the world.
That green bottle of Parmesan cheese in your fridge is just dried cheddar cheese flakes, edible wood pulp, and filler. Real Parmesan cheese is produced into large wheels or wedges that have the term “Parmigiano-Reggiano,” stamped on it. Everything else is fake.
Seafood
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Mislabeling fish is a rampant and inherent business model practice in the seafood industry. Almost 40% of the fish that you order in a restaurant is purposely mislabeled and a cheaper substitution that you are paying more to eat. 94% of the red snapper served in restaurants are fake. Ever ordered lobster? It was probably a cheap substitution 33% of those times.
Cheap fish species are profitable counterfeit foods that boost profit margins but can also cause overfishing issues and ecosystem damage. Your best option to avoid this is to buy from trusted fishmongers.
Truffles
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Truffles are clumps of edible spores that are only found underground in certain forests around the roots of certain trees. Only specially trained pigs or dogs can find them by scent. They take years to grow and can only be grown naturally, the process can’t be replicated anywhere else. Truffles generally cost about $100 per ounce. Two pounds of it was sold for $85,000 in a 2018 European auction.
Consumers want them because they are rare which makes them a profitable fraud food. Unless you buy it yourself or have it shaved in front of you, then it belongs in the counterfeit foods category. Also, truffle oil products either contain minute traces of truffles or are completely fake.
Honey
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Pure honey is actually hard to find and buy cheaply. The corporate brand honey products you buy at the supermarket are often watered down to dilute their quality. A lot of the honey that you buy is actually a mix of honey, corn, or fructose syrup mixed with additives and coloring.
Over 75% of the honey products in supermarkets are technically not real, unadulterated honey. Real honey has pollen particulates in it. There are no laws that stipulate what real honey is or isn’t. Compare products and buy from farmer’s markets or boutique beekeeper brands.
Olive Oil
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Olive oil prices surged by 100% in 2023. The typical price for one pound of authentic Italian or Spanish olive oil is $5 to $6 for the affordable brands but is usually more expensive. It’s in high demand and one of the most profitable counterfeit foods. A lot of fake olive oil is just deceptively mislabeled sunflower, canola, corn, palm, soybean, rapeseed, or any other variety of cooking oil.
Some companies produce cheap olive oil in developing countries, dock a cargo ship with the cheap oil in Spain or Italy for a few days, and then label it as Italian or Spanish to scam you. Italian or Spain-based olive oil has labels with the terms “PDO,” or “PGI,” to prove its origin. Compare other affordable quality olive oil brands as best you can.
Knowledge is the Best Defense Against Counterfeit Foods
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It is not against the law to use vaguely misleading and deceptive terms in food marketing, depending on the product and country. The food industry can find numerous ways to legally sell deliberately mislabeled products. The global counterfeit foods industry is worth over $50 billion.
Remember, knowledge is your best defense against counterfeit foods. Be an informed consumer by thoroughly reading labels and supporting trustworthy food producers.
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Allen Francis is a full-time writer, prolific comic book investor and author of The Casual’s Guide: Why You Should Get Into Comic Book Investing. Allen holds a BA degree from Marymount Manhattan College. Before becoming a writer Allen was an academic advisor, librarian, and college adjunct for many years. Allen is an advocate of best personal financial practices including saving and investing in your own small business.
