isithalal.food

Is Angel Delight Halal?

It depends on where you bought it.

Market-dependent
Medium confidence About this ruling

About this ruling

Condition
Certification and products vary by market
Evidence confidence
Medium means the sources are named, but they do not pin the evidence to a specific market or product. Use this page as orientation, then read the pack in your hand.
How we score High, Medium, and Low

Reviewed

Angel Delight is a UK instant dessert powder from Premier Foods that you whisk into cold milk.

Next step Angel Delight dessert mixes contain no gelatine, and the sachets are marked suitable for vegetarians, so nothing in them comes from a slaughtered animal. They carry no Halal mark, though. The points to weigh are the whey and the E477 emulsifier, whose fat source is not named. How to verify
Scan a label

Photo: Open Food Facts contributors · CC BY-SA 3.0

How to verify

  1. No gelatine: the dessert sets with phosphates and starch.
  2. Look for the vegetarian mark on the sachet.
  3. Whey and E477 (propylene glycol esters of fatty acids) are the ingredients to weigh.
  4. No Halal mark on UK sachets.

Quick checks

  • No gelatine.
  • Marked vegetarian.
  • No Halal mark.

What decides the answer

  • Angel Delight with the vegetarian mark

    no gelatine and nothing from a slaughtered animal; no Halal mark

  • If you only eat certified products

    there is no Halal mark on UK sachets

  • If you avoid whey of unstated origin

    weigh the whey powder

Why this ruling

Angel Delight is a British instant dessert from Premier Foods: a sachet of powder whisked into cold milk that sets into a light mousse in a few minutes. Flavours include strawberry and butterscotch.

What's in the sachet

The Strawberry mix lists sugar, palm oil and modified starch, then emulsifiers, phosphate gelling agents, lactose, milk proteins, strawberry powder, whey powder, colours and flavouring, and is marked vegetarian.[1] A Butterscotch sachet photographed with a 2016 best-before date has a similar recipe with caramel and annatto colours, and the vegetarian symbol.[2] There is no gelatine: the dessert sets with starch and phosphates.

What is left to weigh

Because the sachets are marked suitable for vegetarians, nothing in them should come from a slaughtered animal. Two ingredients still lack a Halal guarantee. One is the emulsifier E477, propylene glycol esters of fatty acids, whose fat source is not named. The other is whey powder, a by-product of cheese-making. There is no Halal mark on the sachets, so Angel Delight is Halal if verified.

For another vegetarian-marked UK treat with no Halal mark, see Celebrations.

Where you'll find it

  • Instant whipped dessert made with cold milk
  • Children's puddings and trifle toppings

Frequently asked questions

Is Angel Delight Halal?
It contains no gelatine and the sachets are marked suitable for vegetarians, so nothing in it comes from a slaughtered animal. It has no Halal mark, so it is Halal if verified.
Does Angel Delight contain gelatine?
No. The UK Strawberry and Butterscotch sachets set with modified starch and phosphate gelling agents, with no gelatine listed.
Is Angel Delight vegetarian?
Yes. The Strawberry sachet on Open Food Facts is marked vegetarian, and a Butterscotch sachet shows the vegetarian symbol.

Scholarly view

Many packet desserts set with gelatine, which is the usual Halal problem. Angel Delight does not: it thickens with starch and phosphate gelling agents. Because the sachets are marked suitable for vegetarians, the E477 emulsifier and other ingredients should not come from slaughtered animals, though no Halal body has checked that.

Whey is made during cheese-making, and some scholars ask whether the cheese used animal rennet; without a Halal mark, that question stays open.

Sources

Named Islamic, certifier, manufacturer, and regulatory sources used on this page. Inline markers like [1] jump here. Retrieval dates show when we last checked the live URL. Editorial methodology.

Manufacturer / product

  1. Angel Delight Strawberry Flavour Dessert Mix, 59 g (barcode 5000354770005)

    Open Food Facts Retrieved

    Jurisdiction: United Kingdom

    Sugar, palm oil, modified starch, emulsifiers (propylene glycol esters of fatty acids, lecithins), gelling agents (sodium phosphates, diphosphates), lactose (milk), milk proteins, strawberry powder (2%), whey powder (milk), calcium carbonate, anti-caking agent (silicon dioxide), colours (beetroot red, carotenes), flavouring. Labelled vegetarian.

  2. Angel Delight Butterscotch Flavour Dessert Mix, 59 g (barcode 5000354770333)

    Open Food Facts (ingredient list checked on the pack photo) Retrieved

    Jurisdiction: United Kingdom

    Photo of a sachet with a best-before date of October 2016: sugar, modified potato starch, vegetable oil (palm), modified maize starch, emulsifiers (propane-1,2-diol esters of fatty acids, sunflower lecithins), gelling agents (disodium phosphate, tetrasodium diphosphate), lactose, sodium caseinates, colours (plain caramel, beetroot red, annatto, mixed carotenes), dried whey, flavourings (contain milk), anti-caking agent. Vegetarian symbol. Trademarks of The Premier Foods Group.

Browse this topic

Open the parent category hub for more foods in the same group.