Nowadays, with the increasing popularity of new ingredients and techniques for mooncakes, there have been many new misconceptions about eating mooncakes. Is it reasonable to say on the internet that the shorter the shelf life of mooncakes, the safer they are? Please ask Ruan Guangfeng, Deputy Director and Associate Research Librarian of the Kexin Food and Health Information Exchange Center, for clarification and clarification in this issue. Many people believe that the long shelf life of mooncakes is due to the addition of preservatives, so when buying mooncakes, they choose those with a short shelf life and believe that such mooncakes have less preservatives. So, is this view correct? Ruan Guangfeng explained that a long shelf life of mooncakes does not necessarily mean that there are too many preservatives added, and the appropriate use of preservatives will not affect the safety of mooncakes. Whether and how much preservatives are needed for mooncakes mainly depends on their ingredients, moisture content, and composition. Especially sweet mooncakes, such as Dousha mooncakes and Wuren mooncakes, have low moisture and high sugar content, making it difficult for microorganisms to reproduce and more durable to store. They not only have fewer preservatives, but also have a longer shelf life. Moon cakes with a soft and glutinous texture, such as egg yolk filling, beef filling, and ham filling, have high moisture content and low sugar content. Even if preservatives are added, the shelf life is relatively short. Is it true that 'sugar free mooncakes' often claim to be sugar free and not cause blood sugar to rise? Ruan Guangfeng analyzed that most so-called sugar free mooncakes use sweeteners to replace sucrose, but it cannot be said that they have no sugar at all. According to the nutrition labeling standards in China, if the name of solid or liquid food needs to be labeled as "sugar free", the sugar content in every 100 grams of food should not exceed 0.5 grams. Mooncakes are mainly made of flour and starch, and even without the addition of sucrose, their sugar content is far higher than the national standard for sugar free foods. Therefore, the so-called sugar free mooncakes are actually commercial promotion, not truly sugar free. Many mooncake advertisements claim to contain precious ingredients such as bird's nest, shark's fin, abalone, and ginseng, which have health benefits. Do these "aristocratic" mooncakes really have health benefits? Ruan Guangfeng stated that the so-called health preserving functions of mooncakes are marketing gimmicks. Although ingredients such as shark fin and bird's nest do have nutritional value, they may not necessarily have higher nutritional value than some ordinary ingredients. Adding them in small amounts to mooncakes also has limited nourishing effects. At the same time, if these ingredients are not handled properly, they may also breed bacteria and increase the risk of consumption. (New News Agency)