Pesticide-Free Huel?

Ric, you’re obviously a very intelligent person. Why don’t calculate an approximate estimate from the known GIs of Huel’s ingredients? Could be a fun project to keep you out of mischief, and also a nice gesture to save the business £3500 during this festive time of giving and joy. :grinning:

I wasn’t being snarky.

Marcus, you’re obviously a very intelligent person. Why not stop trolling people if you disagree with their post. Could be a fun project to keep you out of mischief, and also a nice gesture. :grinning:

Like you, I clearly support Huel. Just because I’m not a 100% fanboi doesn’t mean you have to reply every time you don’t like my opinion.

If you are so concerned, and you have the know-how, why don’t you calculate an approximate estimate from the known GIs of Huel’s ingredients? Could be a nice gesture to save the business £3500 during this festive time of giving and joy.

It’s a bit more complicated than doing a calculation. You also need 10 volunteers.

• Testing conducted according to established expert protocol (WHO/FAO 1998)

• Approved by an independent ethics committee

• All testing is carried out by an experienced GI testing team monitored by GI experts and under

medical supervision

• The latest in glucose analysis equipment – in house static glucose analyzer offering a very high

degree of accuracy

• The GI of a product is determined using a minimum of 10 volunteers

• The product is tested in duplicate

• The glucose reference (control) is tested in triplicate and repeated for each set of testing

• If required, testing can be carried out to determine: available carbohydrate content, insulin response

and various other metabolic markers A comprehensive in-house nutrient analysis service, product

reformulation and our ingredients experts back-up the GI testing service

PRICES

£3,500 per product

They also suggest a insulin analysis.

The price for the insulin analysis per product is £9,000. The turnaround time for one product will be 2-3 weeks on top of the weeks needed to carry out the GI testing.

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Your words, not mine.

But I can reply if I have a comment regarding something you’ve said, as anybody can. You’re right, I don’t have to. But I can, and if I want to I will, as do you and anyone else.

But…correct me if I’m wrong, but you don’t even drink Huel, because they don’t have it in the USA yet? Sometimes I wonder why you’re here. I’m not saying someone can’t be here if they can’t buy Huel because they live in another country. But…you seem to find so many faults with Huel, it just kind of baffles me why you keep coming here. But maybe I’m missing something, I don’t know. Maybe you can help me out with that? Is it because you want to improve it and you’re trying to help? But…I don’t know…that seems a bit strange from someone who’s never even tried it. If it was me, I’d be more focused on the one that I could actually buy and drink (Soylent) than one I can’t. But maybe that’s just me.

And by the way, that whole “fanboy” thing is rather strange. I just like Huel and want to see the business succeed because I want to keep drinking it. It’s that simple really. But if I don’t like something I say so. Like with the unflavoured Huel, which I thought was horrible and kind of pointless, but that’s just my opinion.

As someone who doesn’t even drink Huel, and who seems to deliberately find fault with so many things Julian says, you seem to fit the criteria of a troll more than me. In my opinion of course, and other may of course disagree. But I think I’ve been quite helpful to lots of people since I’ve been here. I know you have been helpful to people too, and that deserves to be acknowledged. But you said that word, not me.

But I may actually do the calculation. I was thinking that when I made that last post. It is just the kind of thing I would do actually.

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year :grinning:

I like Huel. You are correct; I only don’t drink it because it isn’t available in the United States.

I don’t find fault with so many things Julian says. I take issue with him bashing competition, because I think a rising tide raises all ships. I take issues with him claiming other products have a higher GI, when Huel can’t provide us with its own GI.

Of course you can comment on anything. But you have a habit of commenting on me personally, rather than the content. In this case, I made the observation that Huel won’t spend money to determine GI (which many people would like to see), so why would Huel spend money to indicate pesticides (since 1) very few people care about, OP not withstanding, and 2) Huel doesn’t make claims that it is pesticide free). If you think that isn’t a valid obeservation, that’s fine. But I think it is, and others might also. Comment on the claim; no need to direct comments personally to me.

It’s just common courtesy, Marcus. Like the community guidelines say:

“You may wish to respond to something by disagreeing with it. That’s fine. But, remember to criticize ideas, not people. Please avoid responding to a post’s tone instead of its actual content. Instead, provide reasoned counter-arguments that improve the conversation.”

The conversations here set the tone. Just because you add smiley face icons every time you critique me personally doesn’t make it a “good” tone.

Hi @Ric

Thanks for your feedback. To my mind you make a valued contribution here, but sometimes the way people speak with each other online differs between the UK and US - maybe there’s the issue. I’m well aware of this as I own/run a very busy 15 year old discussion forum and I’ve witnessed this many times.

I know I’m bias to stick up for my colleague, but I don’t feel Julian does ‘bash’ competition: he merely points out where Huel is better. Like me, Julian is highly passionate about Huel.

People will disagree online and, even those with a vested interest in a company, have a right to debate an issue and offer an alternative opinion, in the same way that we welcome yours.

The GI issue is a complex one: to do a proper test there is a lot involved. However, it’s likely that the GI of Huel is low - maybe even lower than we think, because some of the non-carb ingredients are known for slowing GI (that’s gastro-intestinal, not glycaemic index!) transit time which will have a bearing on a glycaemic response.

Does this make sense?

Of course it makes sense. My guess is that the GI of Huel is lower than you think. That’s even more reason to test the GI. Then you can definitively say that Huel has a lower GI than the competitors.

@Ric Well, you make some fair comments there.

There may be some truth in what you say about me tending to disagree with you personally. In the interest of transparency, perhaps I can explain why…

When I first discovered Huel, I thought it was brilliant. I really liked the drink, and I really liked the way Julian was doing things here. I could see that it was in its early days, just starting. I felt enthusiastic about it all.

So then you came along, and it seemed to me that you were giving Julian an unnecessarily hard time. I have perhaps given you a bit of a hard time in return because I felt like somebody needed to. To me, you seemed like a trouble-maker. You seemed to be deliberately stirring up trouble. If I misjudged that, fair enough. But that is definitely how it seemed to me. If I seem to have singled you out in disagreements, maybe it’s because you were the only one who was saying so much stuff I disagreed with. And it all seemed so unnecessary from where I was standing (although it’s worth acknowledging that you have made some valid points along the way too).

You also like to bring things back to the forum rules, when it seems you break them yourself. You remind me that we should not make things personal, but you make things personal too. Even in your last message, you quote the rules saying not to comment on the tone, then comment on the tone of my messages. That doesn’t really make any sense to me. You can’t really have it both ways.

As I say, if I have misunderstood anything here, then that’s fair enough, I accept that. As James says, maybe it’s partly due to a difference between the way British and American people. Maybe it’s partly due to the nature of text-based communication having a high risk of misunderstandings. Or maybe my brain just works differently to yours.

I understand most conflicts are 50/50, and I acknowledge my part. I could easily have ignored the person who appeared (to me) to be a trouble maker. But if you want to know why I have behaved as I have, that’s it. If you see things differently (and if I too seemed like a trouble maker from your point of view), that’s fair enough, I can accept that.

Perhaps we could shake hands (virtually speaking) and both make an effort to get along better, for the sake of the greater good?

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Wow. I think this thread could use some pesticides.

So, 15 months later, any update yet?

@sanovine yes we have got some details for you @Gulliver_Huel will supply the details.

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@sanovine You can view our pesticide reports on our Huel Food Safety and Quality Controls page

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Dunno if it’s possible to stick a “conclusion” note to the start of this long discussion, but here’s my attempt to summarise the tests on Huel’s official food safety page. I am not an expert, so read 'em yourself if you care.

“Chemicals”:
Six ingredients (oats, pea protein, brown rice protein, flaxseed, coconut MCTs and sunflower oil powder) were tested for chemical residues in 2015. The tests were for many hundreds of residues, and in some cases also covered genetic modification markers and metals. The only residue detected above the detection limit (smallest measurement they could make) was of Chlormequat, which was found at 0.04mg/kg in the oats. This is very low: 0.44% of the European MRL (maximum residue limit) of 9mg/kg. The pea protein test also identified levels of aluminium and cadmium typical for cereals (and well below EFSA (European Food Safety Authority) limits). Chlormequat isn't a pesticide by the way: it thickens plant stems, making them easier to harvest.
Heavy metals:
Complete Huel was tested for heavy metals twice in late 2016. I've averaged the results and then translated from the μg/kg measurements to actual daily intake assuming a 100% Huel diet at 2000 calories — 500g — per day. Along with those figures I include the typical daily intake of these metals for an 85kg adult, based on EFSA estimates (which are usually expressed in μg per kilo of bodyweight per day):
  • Arsenic: 7.1μg/day (11–48μg/day typical)
  • Cadmium: 36.9μg/day (98–666μg/day typical)
  • Lead: 9.2μg/day (31–105μg/day typical)
  • Mercury: below detection limit.

… so the indications are that an all-Huel diet may well be markedly lower in many of these undesirables than a conventional diet. Interesting.

[EDIT: California’s cadmium limits are quite a bit lower than Europe’s, and the reproductive risk for pregnant women figures are all substantially lower again, but if the above numbers are typical exposure I’ve no idea what value lower official safe numbers have. Would be interesting to hear from a professional on that front. I think part of this derives from safe levels often being defined in terms of observed exposure, which numbers will vary according to local diet. For example I understand that the UK’s safe radiation exposure levels were for quite some time determined by observed exposure of Welsh eaters of seaweed-based laverbread.]

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Nice one Huel team, thanks for that!

Surprisingly, 3 out of 5 of Huel’s main ingredients are sourced from China (Pea Protein, Brown Rice Protein, MCT Powder). Apart from the impact on Huel’s carbon footprint for sourcing these ingredients from China, the country has a major and critical pollution problem. It is indeed estimated that more than 10% of China’s agriculture soil is polluted. It is really disappointing to see a product with a high focus on health like Huel sourcing 3 out of 5 of its main ingredients from China. There are many other countries producing these ingredients with higher standards of quality and safety.
sources:
https://www.economist.com/news/briefing/21723128-and-fixing-it-will-be-hard-and-costly-most-neglected-threat-public-health-china
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2014/jun/30/the-human-cost-of-chinas-untold-soil-pollution-problem

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Have to admit this slightly concerns me too.

Like many I’m sure, I believe China still has some catching up to do, with regards to regularly adhering to production standards in a numbers of industries.

I have no doubt they’ll get there as both Chinese and International buyers push them to.

Also recognise that uk/eu/us have their own problems, but my feeling is there’s a difference of degree, for no doubt multiple reasons.

The nub for me is that whilst I may take a risk with an eBay special, my diet is in a very different risk category.

Id welcome other thoughts including the Huel team.

Hi guys

I believe I covered your concerns here. You’re judging the quality of a product purely on unwarranted negative perceptions based on what you’ve heard about ingredients from a country, not on Huel’s quality procedures.

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“The page you requested does not exist.”

Is there a new link?

Link is for the UK site which I expect is why it isn’t working for you. Just toggle the flag top right to the UK to view it. However if you are in the USA then we don’t have the same article, but are working on it.

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Missed James’ response.

I don’t think my concerns are unwarranted.

I have experience in an unrelated industry and based on that I believe the risks associated with sourcing food and other products from China are greater.

Whether Huels quality procedures are sufficient to offset the risk I perceive, I have no way of knowing.

Of course one way of measuring how much weight i give to the risk, is that I’ve just placed my next order :blush: