Soy Protein Powder water processed?!
Soy Protein Powder water processed?
My Soy Protein Powder from Trader's Joe says 'water processed' and no preservative or artificial flavors and colors. Its not organic though and I have read that if soy is not organic then a petroleum solvent called hexane might have been used to process soy! But since they say 'water processed' on the label I wonder if that means no hexane was used. Anybody know?
Answers:
You would need to contact the company to know for sure. It does not guarantee that no hexane was used.
However, I'd say it could have used hexane. It's a two step process:
Step 1, defat the soy, for conventional (non organic) this is typically done with hexane as a solvent. What is left is soy concentrate. (Organic soy concentrate is separated mechanically, which is more expensive.)
Step 2, to get protein concentrate from the soy concentrate there are 3 commonly used options
a: Alcohol
b. Acid Wash
c. Hot water leaching.
So I think that "water processed" simply means that they used hot water leaching in step 2. It says nothing about what they used for step 1.