Additives that are not vegetarian
Made from slaughtered animals, fish, crustaceans or insects. 23 additives.
Every additive here is also on the not vegan list. That list is longer because it adds milk, egg, wool and bee products.
| Additive | Vegan | Vegetarian | What it is made from |
|---|---|---|---|
| Animal lipase | No | No | Extracted from the forestomach tissue of calves, kids or lambs, or from animal pancreatic tissue. |
| Antarctic krill meal | No | No | Dried and milled Euphausia superba, a small crustacean harvested in the Southern Ocean. |
| Avian pepsin | No | No | Obtained from the glandular stomachs of chickens. It is an animal-derived enzyme, and anyone avoiding animal ingredients should treat it as one. |
| Bone phosphate INS 542 | No | No | Made by degreasing, calcining and grinding the bones of slaughtered animals, usually cattle. Chemically it is much the same as mineral-sourced calcium phosphate, but its origin is not, and the source is not evident from a label that simply says calcium phosphate. |
| Carmines E120 | No | No | Extracted from the dried bodies of the female cochineal scale insect, Dactylopius coccus, farmed chiefly in Peru and the Canary Islands. Carminic acid is drawn out with hot water and precipitated as an aluminium lake. Because it is insect-derived it is not vegan or vegetarian, and it raises questions under some halal and kosher rulings. |
| Catalase (bovine liver) | No | No | Extracted from bovine liver. A microbial catalase from Micrococcus lysodeikticus is listed separately and is not animal-derived. |
| Chitosan | No | No | Made by treating chitin with alkali. Chitin comes mainly from shrimp and crab shells, which makes most chitosan a shellfish-derived ingredient; fungal sources exist. |
| Cholic acid INS 1000 | No | No | Cholic acid is the principal bile acid of mammals and is obtained commercially from the bile of slaughtered cattle and sheep. Anyone avoiding animal-derived ingredients should treat it as one. |
| Cochineal extract; carmine | No | No | Extracted from the dried bodies of the female cochineal scale insect, Dactylopius coccus. Because it is insect-derived it is neither vegan nor vegetarian, and it raises questions under some halal and kosher rulings. |
| Desoxycholic acid | No | No | A bile acid of mammals, obtained commercially from bile. Anyone avoiding animal-derived ingredients should treat it as one. |
| Fish protein isolate | No | No | Extracted and purified from fish, with the oil and other fractions removed. |
| Gelatin | No | No | Made by partial hydrolysis of collagen from the skin, tendons, ligaments and bones of animals — usually pigs and cattle, sometimes fish. It is an animal product, and which animal it came from matters for several diets. |
| Hydrogenated sperm oil | No | No | Hardened by hydrogenation from oil taken from the sperm whale. Sperm whales are protected internationally and the oil is not in commercial use, so the listing outlived its trade. |
| Menhaden oil | No | No | Pressed and refined from menhaden, a small oily Atlantic fish caught in bulk for oil and meal rather than eaten directly. |
| Myoglobin | No | No | Extracted from animal muscle tissue. It is an animal protein, and the colour changes people see in meat are this molecule binding oxygen and then oxidising. |
| Ox bile extract | No | No | Extracted from the bile of cattle, a slaughterhouse by-product. |
| Pancreas extract | No | No | Extracted from the pancreas of slaughtered animals, usually pigs or cattle. It is an animal-derived preparation. |
| Pancreatin | No | No | Extracted from the pancreas of pigs or cattle, a slaughterhouse by-product. Microbial enzymes now do much of the same work. |
| Pepsin | No | No | Extracted from the glandular layer of porcine or bovine stomachs. The porcine source is why pepsin raises a specific concern under halal and kosher rules beyond the general question of animal derivation. |
| Shellac, bleached E904 | No | No | Scraped from tree branches as the secretion of the lac insect, Kerria lacca, in India and Thailand, then washed, filtered and bleached. Insect fragments are removed during refining but the raw material is an insect product. |
| Spermaceti wax | No | No | Obtained from the spermaceti organ of the sperm whale. It is an animal product from a protected species. |
| Trypsin | No | No | Extracted from the pancreatic tissue of cattle or pigs, a slaughterhouse by-product. |
| Whole fish protein concentrate | No | No | Made by extracting the oil and water from whole fish and drying the remaining protein. |
What this list is not
It is not a list of foods, and it is not dietary advice. It lists additives, not what a food contains. Processing aids, carriers and other ingredients can bring in animal material that no additive entry covers. Each additive’s page gives the full derivation.