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In America, the Hostess Fruit Pie is an iconic dessert. These hand-held pies are made with a flaky crust and filled with a sweet, fruit filling. However, are Hostess Fruit Pies vegan?
Hostess Fruit Pies might be vegan, but they contain Natural flavors and Mono & Diglycerides, which can could contain ingredients sourced from animals.
Below is a table showing Hostess Fruit Pies flavors and its vegan status.
| Flavor | Vegan Status |
| Hostess Apple Fruit Pie | Maybe, contains Natural flavors and Mono & Diglycerides. |
| Hostess Cheery Fruit Pie | Maybe, contains Natural flavors and Mono & Diglycerides. |
Hostess Fruit Pies Ingredients
Below is a list of ingredients from all the flavors that I could find.
- Agar
- Calcium Carbonate
- Cherries
- Cinnamon
- Citric Acid
- Dehydrated Apples (Treated With Sulfur Dioxide To Retain Color)
- Dextrose
- Enriched Flour
- Folic Acid
- Glycerin
- Malted Barley
- Modified Food Starch
- Mono & Diglycerides
- Natural Flavors
- Niacin
- Palm Oil
- Preservatives
- Red 40
- Reduced Iron
- Riboflavin
- Salt
- Sodium Benzoate
- Sodium Propionate
- Sorbitan Monostearate
- Soy Lecithin
- Sugar
- Thiamine Mononitrate
- Water
- Wheat Flour
- Xanthan Gum
[Source]
As always I’ve highlighted the ingredients that we need to take a closer look at.
Questionable Ingredients
Sugar
This is an highly questionable ingredient because of the possible presence of bone char. The most common sugar types are beet sugar and cane sugar with the latter being the most popular sugar in the candy and sweets industry.
Raw cane sugar is vegan, but it’s often refined to before it’s used in products and in this refining process the cane sugar is also bleached. A common method is to use bone char from dead cows and exploiting animals in the production process would make the sugar non-vegan.
Natural Flavors
This ingredient is an umbrella term, meaning that it can consist of several ingredients and the source of these ingredients are almost never disclosed on the ingredients label. This means that natural flavors can contain ingredients from animals and there is no way of knowing this only by reading the ingredients label.
The best way to be sure is to contact the company and ask. There is an interesting article on National Geographic where they disclosed that butt goo from beavers could be used in vanilla flavors. So vegans needs to careful when it comes to flavor ingredients.
Palm Oil
Palm oil is a very controversial ingredient and many people are staying away from palm oil not only vegans. The problem is the severe deforestation that is taking place in order to build more palm oil plantations. The wild life is being forced away from their homes.
There is a way for the palm oil to be more vegan-friendly and it’s called RSPO. It’s an non-profit organisation that helps companies produce and buy sustainable palm oil. Hostess is a RSPO member, meaning that the palm oil in their fruit pies are indeed vegan-friendly.
Artificial Colors
Artificial colors have been tested on animals in the past and the testing might still be going on. Causing animals suffering is not something that aligns with veganism and many vegans are staying away from these colors.
There are other testing method such as computer simulations that can do a great job. There are also some health issues connected to artificial colors such as hyper activity in kids.
Mono & Diglycerides
This ingredient can be made from both plants and animals.
Soy
Soy is one of the most common GMO crops in USA and the problem with GMO crops is the high amount of herbicide that is needed. The herbicide can pollute the surrounding environment and cause severe damage to the ecosystem.
Conclusion
There are several ingredients that could be sourced from animals in Hostess Fruit Pies and therefore it’s unknown if they are vegan or not. If you want to be sure to eat 100% vegan fruit pies then I would advice to make them yourself.
Thanks for reading, take care!
