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An ingredient is a substance that is part of a mixture (in a general sense). For example, in cooking, recipes indicate which ingredients are used to prepare a particular dish. Many commercial products contain secret ingredients that are said to make them better than competing products. In the pharmaceutical industry, an active ingredient is that part of a formulation that produces the effect expected by the consumer.

List of ingredients on a box of bone marrow peas. Apart from peas, the product also contains water, salt and the antioxidant E385.

National laws usually prepared food products to display a list of ingredients, and specifically require that certain additives be listed.

In most developed countries, the law requires ingredients to be listed according to their relative weight in the product. If an ingredient itself consists of more than one ingredient (for example, cookie chunks that are part of a cookie and cream flavored ice cream), then that ingredient is listed according to the percentage of the total product it occupies, with its own ingredients displayed alongside with it in brackets.

The term “constituent” is often chosen when referring to the substances that make up the tissues of living things, such as plants and humans, since the word “ingredient” in many minds denotes the feeling of human agency (that is, something which combines a person with other substances), for example then how natural products present in living things were not added by any human agency but appeared naturally (“the plant has no ingredients”). Thus, all ingredients are constituents, but not all constituents are ingredients.

Additives serve a variety of beneficial functions in foods that consumers often take for granted. Some additives can be discarded if we want to grow our own food, harvest and chop, spend many hours cooking and canning, or risk spoiling food. But most consumers today rely on the many technological, aesthetic and convenience benefits that supplements provide.

Preservatives slow down food deterioration caused by mould, air, bacteria, fungi or yeast. In addition to maintaining food quality, they help control contamination that can cause foodborne illness, including life-threatening botulism. The group of preservatives – antioxidants – prevents fats, oils and products containing them from rancidity and unpleasant taste. They also prevent sliced fresh fruits such as apples from browning in the air.

Vitamins and minerals (and fibre) are added to many foods to replace those missing from the human diet or lost through processing or improving the nutritional quality of food. This gain and enrichment have helped reduce malnutrition in the United States and around the world. All foods containing added nutrients must be labelled accordingly.

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