August 30, 2010- Citric acid, E 330, with its sour taste is quite a liked flavor in our everyday foods consumption. A weak organic acid, citric acid works as a natural preservative, that is a part of the majority of packaged foods available in the market. Apart from being a preferred natural preservative, it is also a popular flavor enhancer for food and beverages. Specially the cold drinks that we consume with almost every alternate meals, contain citric acid majorly.
Coming on to the citric foods, there are two ways to classify the citric foods. One is the natural citric acid sources like fruits and vegetables that contain citric acid. These fruits in their natural state contain citric acid and lend these fruits a sour taste. The other lot of foods that contain citric acid are the ones that do not naturally have it in them. Citric acid is added to these foods in some way or the other. Lets go through the detailed list of citric foods and citric acid sources below.
Citrus fruits like limes, lemons and oranges are the main citric acid sources. Citric acid is what lends these fruits their citrus, sour taste. Highest citric acid content is found in limes and lemons, oranges and other fruits like berries etc contains comparatively lesser amounts. Citric juice is extracted from these citrus fruits and added to a variety of food products for flavoring as well as for preservation.
Of citrus fruits the ones that contain lesser amounts of citric acid are the berries and a few vegetables. All kinds of berries like the cranberry, raspberry, strawberry, blackcurrant, redcurrant, gooseberries, cherries; all of them are citric acid sources and citric juice foods. Other exotic citric juice fruits are pineapple and tamarind. Among the vegetable citric acid sources, tomatoes and lettuce also contain citric acid in small amounts.
Citric Foods - Fermentation By-ProductMost of cheese varieties contain citric acid as it is a fermentation by product. It is a sure by product of the industrial cheese making processes, but as for the natural cheese making process, nothing can be said with surety. As a fermentation by products, the citric acid foods are all industrially produced varieties of cheese, wine and sourdough breads.
As a food additive acid, citric acid is added to a number of food products for an additional flavor and preservation. Some of the everyday citric acid foods are: