What is Sodium Tripolyphosphate Doing in Your Fish?
By Marie Logan
Seafood lovers beware: there’s a chemical that threatens to deceive you about the freshness of your flaky fillets of fish. You might be paying more for seafood that contains this chemical, because it can increase the weight of the products to which it’s applied. Worse, you might not even know it’s there, because labeling of this potentially toxic chemical is not mandatory in the U.S.
So what is it? It’s an additive—called sodium tripolyphosphate, or STPP for short—and it is used to make your seafood appear firmer, smoother and glossier. Seafood manufacturers may soak your seafood in a quick chemical bath of STPP in order
to achieve these effects. Some of the more commonly “soaked” seafood items include scallops, shrimp and anything filleted that’s very flaky—like hake, sole or imitation crab meat. (For those of you following food safety news, this is similar to the spraying of carbon monoxide on red meat, which can make older meat appear fresher than it is.)
If seafood is soaked for too long in an STPP bath, it may absorb more water, which means you’ll pay more for the product by the pound because the excess water makes it weigh more. A product may have been “soaked” with STPP if a milky white liquid oozes from the fish as you cook it, and it may also deflate in size a bit.
In large quantities, STPP is a suspected neurotoxin, as well as a registered pesticide and known air contaminant in the state of California.
How can one steer clear of STPP? Ask at your market or fish shop if the scallops or shrimp you’re being sold are “dry.” You can ask the same thing of waiters at seafood restaurants—they should have an understanding of the topic. (In industry-speak, “wet” fish means a product has been soaked in phosphates.) You can also check labels of packaged products, which may list STPP as an ingredient. Unfortunately, it’s not mandatory for companies and sellers to do so.
Remember, consumers have the power. Start wielding yours today! Find out where the fish you’re ordering comes from, and how it’s produced, to help influence your local food system.
Read up more on STPP in our fact sheet, “What’s on Your Fish?” As always, if you have any questions, please post them here in our comments section and we’ll do our best to respond in a timely manner.
I bought some cod fillets at Kroger the other day. And low and behold they have this chemical in them! I’ll never buy cod from Kroger again! I’m sick of this stuff!
OMG I just bought salmom at ALDI there is STPP and is from China. I am not consuming this fish. I give it to the dogs..geee… why are we getting all this shit in our food???
FDA do your job!! Labeling is a basic function and consumer right. STPP and GMO should be required on the label… and sodium content should be based on 1,800 mg, as recommended, not the 2,200 you allow. Lobbying has ruined you FDA!!
I paid $12 for a pound of sea scallops. We sauteed them, cover off, but they weren’t browning in the oil/butter mixture. They were boiling in the juice made by the heated scallops. I put cumin on them to give them a bit of color. Now, cumin is a little bitter, but I can stick a wet finger in a bottle of cumin and suck on it and I will never get the bitter chemical taste that came from those scallops when they were finally on our plates. My dinner guest reminded me scallops are barnacles, and I said, well then, these barnacles were just scraped from a freshly painted boat. Later I googled “scallops and bitter” and guess what, I’m sure these things were overdosed with sodium tripolyphosphate. The uneaten scallops are going back to Safeway. I feel like telling the fish manager to eat one of them.
I have found that virtually all fish sold at Walmart and Aldi have this or some other type of chemical added “to retain color”. I also noticed that most are products of China, Taiwan, or Vietnam. I will NOT spend my money on these products anymore. A very informative documentary on the American food industry is Food Inc. (Netflix, Amazon Prime)
I bought salmon from china at walmart and found that it had stpp in it. We should do something about the food industry, I mean just the thought of the food and drug adminatration. Why are these two groups together!
I bought a bag of Tilapia Filets at Sams Club in D.C. and after consuming the fish several days I developed a “flu-like” symtom, chills, headache and a spike in my blood pressure to 220/110 which took me to the hospital – of course doctors were not able to figure out what had caused all this, but after reading the ingredients in the fish package which came from China my wife and I realized this had been caused by STPP. It would be convenient that the FDA re-consider the import of products coming from China or any other country using this harmful chemical.
I guess I am a little slow on the STPP thing. I ate some frozen shrimp and when I woke up in the morning my feet were so swollen I could hardly bend my ankles. Oops, then I read the label and found out the STPP is used to make the fish hold water. It obvously worked on my whole system too. It too over 24 hours for my feet to return to normal. I imagine most other tissues in my body were water-logged.
Buying frozen products and other packaged foods is becoming a chemistry nightmare.
I purchased a pound of scallops this week because they were labeled product of USA, wild caught. Ingredients were scallop and sodium tripolyphosphate, water. In checking out what tripolyphosphate was I am upset to think product from the USA was doing this. Big Disappointment!
Everyone is complaining about chemicals in fish. Why does no one talk about meats and the hundreds of other products which contain these additives? Are you all being paid by the meat industry? EVERY ham has STPP in it, as does bacon, chicken , turkey and a host of others. You people should read the labels more carefully! Ultimately these additives are less harmful overall than the average soft drink. If you’re going to talk purist, grow your own vegetables, catch your own fish and slaughter your own cows. Otherwise accept tha fact that additives make more products accessible to more people. Peroiod.
Read labels folks. If you have no idea what the ingredient is, then DO NOT buy it! Vote with your dollars. The same goes for your skin care products. Anything you put on your skin goes into your bloodstream within 26 seconds. Yes, the additives and chemicals put in our food/skin care supply (GMO’s as well) make them accessible to more people ata cheaper rate, but at what cost for future health? Cheap food/products now equals high medical expenses in the future. And no, we do not have to grow our own produce, slaughter our own cattle, catch our own fish…there are outlets for that as well. And, it is not as expensive as one believes. The only way we avoid taking responsibility for not doing the right thing, eating the right and healthy things or using the healthier products is by refusing to educate ourselves and toss the blame to those that manufacture the product. YOU decide where you shop, what you use and eat. No one else spends that money for you.
Sodium tripolyphosphate is a sodium salt of triphosphoric acid. It is manufactured in chemical laboratories by mixing disodium phosphate and monosodium phosphate.
Sodium tripolyphosphate gives a fresh appearance to meat and seafood while slowing down spoilage. The chemical helps to preserve the natural color of meat and fish and improves their texture. This is done by improving the water-holding capacity of animal products and consequently slowing down their drying.
It would be safe to say that many supermarkets, e.g. Walmart, Aldi, Price Chopper, etc have sodium tripolyphosphate in their fish and meat products. Check the labels and ask before purchasing these products.
You can neutralize the smell by soaking in white vinegar; don’t buy the product, or take it back for a refund. Your voice speaks volumes to the food industry.