Introduction
Food Safety and Standard Act, 2006 deals with establishment of scientific standards for the control, storage, selling, distribution and import of foods to ensure that healthy and nutritious foods are accessible to humans.
In order to fulfill its objectives, FSSAI has issued some guidelines to check adulteration at home. These testing tricks are so simple that anybody can test it on the very spot without doing any hard practice.
Detecting Starch Adulteration in Butter
- Take some water/ Oil in a transparent glass bowl
- Add ½ teaspoon of butter in it
- Add 2-3 drops of iodine solution to the bowl
- No colour change will be observed in the solution with unadulterated butter
- The solution with adulterated butter changes it’s colour to blue
Detecting Starch Adulteration in Milk
- Take 10ml of milk in a container
- Add some water to the milk
- Shake the container thoroughly
- Appearance of very thin layer of foam in the unadulterated milk
- Appearance of thick layer of foam in the adulterated milk
Detecting Starch sources like mashed potatoes, sweet potatoes etc. Adulteration in Ghee
- Take ½ teaspoon of Ghee in a transparent glass bowl
- Take 2-3 drops of iodine solution to the ghee
- No colour will be observed in unadulterated ghee
- Adulterated ghee changes it’s colour to blue
Detecting Urea Adulteration in Milk
- Take a teaspoon of ,milk in a test tube
- Add ½ teaspoon of soybean of arhar dal powder in the test tube
- Mix up the contents thoroughly by shaking the test tube
- Wait for 5 Mins
- Now dip a red litmus paper
- Wait for ½ min
- Remove the red litmus paper
- The red litmus paper dipped in the unadulterated milk does not change colour
- The red litmus paper in the adulterated milk turns blue
Detecting Dhatura Adulteration in Foodgrains
- Take a small quantity of foodgrains in a glass plate
- Closely examine for blackish brown seeds with flat edges called Dhatura
- The unadulterated foodgrains will not have any Dhatura seeds
- The adulterated foodgrains will have dhatura seeds.
Detacting Kesari Dal Adulteration in Toor Dal
- Take a small quantity of dal on a glass plate
- Closely examine for Khesari dal which is square in shape and has rough edges with a slant on one side
- The unadultersted arhar will not have Khesari Dal
- The adulterated arhar will have pieces of Khesari dal which can be separated by close visual examination
Detecting water adulteration in Milk
- Take a clean glass slide/ plate
- Slowly pour 1-2 ml of milk sample vertically on the glass plate/ slide
- If the drop moves slowely leaving a white trail that means milk is pure
- But if the drop flows rapidly without any trail it means it has been adulterated with water
Detecting Artificial colour Adulteration in Green Peas
- Take some green peas in a transparent glass
- Add water to it, mix well and wait for half an hour
- Unadulterated green peas do not leave any colour
- Green peas adulterated with artificial colour, the water turns green
Detecting Chalk adulteration in Salt
- Take some water in glass
- Add salt in the glass of water, stir it well
- Unadulterated salt dissolves completely in the water with no sediments at the bottom of the glass
- Adulterated salt turns the water slightly white and some impurities are visible at the bottom of the glass
Detecting Oil Adulteration in Coconut Oil
- Take some coconut oil in container
- Keep the container inside the refrigerator with a temperature between 5-10 degrees
- Then wait foe 60-90 minutes
- The form of the coconut oil remains unchanged
- Adulterated coconut oil has a separate layer on top after solidification which is due to the separate freezing points of different oils
Detecting Sugar adulteration in Honey
- Take some water in a glass
- Then add few drops of honey to the glass
- No dispersion is observed in the glass and we see the honey settles at the bottom
- Adulterated honey disperses in the water
Detecting Chalk adulteration in Sugar
- Take two galsses of water
- Then add on 10gs of sugar and stir it well
- Unadulterated Sugar dissolves completely in the water with no sediments at the bottom of the glass
- Adulterated sugar leaves some impurities at the bottom of the glass
Detecting Colour Adulteration in Food grains
- Take a glass of water
- Then add 2 teaspoons of foodgrains in the water, mix thoroughly
- The water containing unadulterated food grains does not change colour
- The water containing adulterated foodgrains changes colour
Detecting Papaya Seeds Adulteration in Black Pepper
- Take some amout of black pepper
- Take a glass of water
- Add some black pepper into it
- The container with adulterated black pepper has seeds settle at the bottom of the glass
- If there is any sediment left then it is adulterated with Papaya seeds.
Detecting common salt adulteration in Iodised Salt
- Take a potato and cut it into 2 pieces
- Apply the samples of salt on the cut surfaces and wait for a minute
- Add two drops of lemon juice on both the samples
- The potato does not change colour because of double fortified salt
- Adulterated iodised salt makes the potato turn blue