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Some vegetarians--usually strict vegans--will not consume
sugar. This is because sugar is often whitened with bone
char from cows.
If you are a vegetarian and you want to continue eating
products that contain sugar, but do not want to cause
suffering in the process, you have a number of options.
Your first option is to only consume products made with
beet sugar. There are two major sources of sugar in the
United States: beet sugar and cane sugar. Cane sugar is
often whitened with bone char from cows; in contrast, beet
sugar is never whitened with bone char.
So, if you want to completely avoid the bone char, you can
do so by eating only beet sugar. The only challenge--and it
is a big one--is finding out which foods contain beet sugar
and which foods contain cane sugar.
To make things more complex, you can also consume a number
of types of cane sugar, as long as you are willing to find
out what the source of the sugar is.
You can do this in a lot of cases by looking at the
nutritional panel on food before you buy it. If it says
fructose or dextrose, the sugar is from a plant source
(either beet or corn). If it says sucrose, it could be from
a number of sources, which could include bone char-whitened
cane sugar.
Now, if you are cooking with sugar, you can personally
verify that is bone-char free by purchasing from the
following companies, which have publicly-stated that they
do not use bone-char: Florida Crystals Refinery, Imperial
Sugar Company, Irish Sugar Ltd., Sugar In the Raw (which is
also less-refined), and American Crystal Sugar Company.
If you can’t find these brands, but want to avoid consuming
bone-char sugar if possible, you can avoid these brands,
which have publicly-stated that they do use bone-char:
Domino, Savannah Foods, and C&H Sugar Company.
Investigation
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