Oh, and I thought...

That the citric acid used as a preservative in most foods (and the kind you find sold in powdered form) was mostly made as a byproduct of the production of corn syrup. I read that a long time ago. That's the reason it's so prevalently used as a preservative, because it's just laying around after the making of corn syrup and is available very cheap. Kinda like the reason they use cotton seed oil in the making of junk food, because it's available very cheap after cotton has been cleaned (and cotton seeds are not really a food).

I'm not sure if aspergillis is part of the production of citric acid or not when it's the by-product of corn syrup. But I do know that's why it's in so many foods as a preservative, as opposed to something else. It's cheap. Tweet