To think it's impossible to eat a UPF free diet as an ordinary person?

This thread is crazy, and some posts really are peak Mumsnet. It’s a stock cube, not crack cocaine.

OP, I think you’re so deep into the details you need to take a breath, zoom out, and see the bigger picture. UPFs are not poison, and small amounts here and there won’t ’contaminate’ the rest of your diet.

Eat mostly healthy food, most of the time, and don’t overthink things. I seriously think threads like this do more harm than good, as they inevitably attract posters who are prone to the same black and white thinking as the OP, who then fails to see how extreme their views are.

Exactly. Tomorrow I'm making chicken and vegetable soup, I have some homemade stock to use but I will also add another stock cube which is a quarter of a stock cube per portion if I make 4.

For a chilli I'll put in 3 beef ones along side a couple of squares of dark chocolate but I'll easily get 10 portions out of it and it's packed full of vegetables and beans.

I will not be making my own mayonnaise because I'm pretty sure it will work out more expensive and I don't use that much so it will just go to waste. I would much rather use a tablespoon of shop bought here and there.

I'm not going to lose sleep over my consumption of UPFs which is sometimes too many (like today I'm having shop bought stuffed pasta, a shop bought sauce, I've eaten a chocolate bar, had a can of coke zero and I'm drinking prosecco.

Tomorrow I'll have a cheese and tomato omelette for breakfast, homemade chilli for dinner and something else for lunch. I have sweeteners in my coffee, I will definitely have a can of coke zero but other than that and the oxos in my chilli it's miles ahead of today. Could I make it better? Yes. Am I willing to? No.

I put weight on because I'm a greedy pig with a love of high calorie food like cheese and cream. As soon as I cut back and eat more lower calorie foods I lose the weight. I do naturally eat less UPFs I suppose because I'm conscious of the calories but you will have to prise the daily can of coke zero out of my cold dead hands.

I prefer to add a stock cube to my soups.
It's one stock cube.
It's fine as part of an otherwise healthy diet.

of course a stock cube from a factory is UPF! but you don't need to use one to make soup! just leave it out. the soup will still taste good.

and i've seen a few people mention miso as an alternative to a stock cube, although some falsely describe it as a UPF.

Miso is a traditionally-fermented (so processed, rather than ultra-processed) foodstuff, which you could in theory make at home - something many Japanese people still do each year.

As long as you buy natural, organic miso, it's fine. I would tend to avoid sachets of 'instant miso flavour' style stuff, as it's more likely to contain weird unnessary additives

I just buy Jason bread and rolls or Crosta Mollica. Only eat bread once a day 4 days a week.I have home made granola and Greek yogurt for breakfast.

Some are really over thinking this.

Tim Spector aims for 80/20.

@MyHealthyMission where are you getting your definition of UPF’s from?
& that sour dough is “more healthy” that a fresh made whole grain loaf?

genuinely interested.

I thought variety was the spice of life the key to a balanced diet?

You could replace beef stock with miso which is processed rather than ultra processed.

As someone else has said, aim for 80/20 or 90/10 rather than tying yourself up in knots trying to be 100% UPF free. It is not easily achievable even when you have loads of time. The simpler you eat, the more easily achievable it is.

I just do what I can. Have always made meals from real foods anyway and over the last few years have stopped buying packaged loaves of bread. I do buy fresh sourdough but rarely have it myself. I tend to eat yoghurt at breakfast and a bean or fish or feta salad at lunch and then a normal home cooked meal.

I don't mind sourdough bread (usually only have it when eating out for breakfast/lunch) but when it's toasted I nearly break my teeth on the crust!

Live 80/20. When I first started my UPF free journey I basically made my life hell. Getting obsessed with little things like trying to make my own horseradish for a Sunday dinner. Now I just buy the jarred stuff. I make all my own bread, soups and generally eat well etc but I do it because I enjoy it. It started making me miserable when I was obsessed. What’s the point of that?

I think it’s fine to just make changes wherever you can and eat UPFs in moderation. Have a small treat every day if you want but make substitutions in other areas and eat whole foods where you can. If you can make your own stocks then great but I wouldn’t beat myself up over a few stock cubes especially with soup for example which is otherwise packed full of good stuff.

I tend to make my own stock, but you can also buy fresh stock in the chilled section, which may not be perfect, but will be better than a cube.

I don't bake my own bread, but I buy it from a local bakery.

It doesn't have to be all or nothing, but finding swaps that work for you

Sorry, forgot the point of the thread! I use an organic dried vegetable bouillon instead of stock unless I really need the extra meat flavour for some reason. I don't think it is necessary in most dishes if they are seasoned well.

I add fresh rolled oats to yoghurt, fruit and nuts for breakfast every morning. I agree with you, I don't like soggy oats.

I’m no cook but making stock is one of the easiest things in the world, especially if you get started when you are in the kitchen anyway making something else and also using a slow cooker. Five mins prep, wait overnight and low and behold, concentrated stock to go in the freezer

Really does make all the difference to home made soup.

According to an interview I read recently he said he started off feeling fairly moderate about the whole thing but as he’s gone down the rabbit hole he’s very strict about it now, and getting more so as time goes on.

In MY PERSONAL experience any diet that only rates the ‘purity’ of foods can lead very quickly to overwhelm, distress around food, food avoidance as nothing is ‘good enough’ and bingeing.

You can say you ate /served up something on here, doesn’t matter what it is, anything, and it will be wrong. You’ll be told how to improve it, replace it, leave it out. Its all just noise. By trial and error, I’m learning what works best for me and (I know you weren’t recommending it) I’ve honestly no interest in reading ‘Ultra Processed People’, especially after reading the interview.

The only UPF I eat is protein shakes which are clearly very optional.

But I have a very boring diet. It’s not expensive.

Breakfast either omelette (say 3 eggs with bread from breadmaker) make the bread on Sunday and slice and freeze. Or natural yogurt berries and chia seeds (only 5g a day so not expensive)

Lunch - tuna / salmon / cottage cheese etc with salad

Dinner - chicken with vegetables. Or salmon with veg. Could add rice / potatoes.

snacks - fruit / nuts / 85% choc.

Re: the stock, buy the best reasonably priced one, it’s only a small % of the meal. I’d focus on getting it mostly UPF free. Just like I’m not too worried by the whey protein powder.

I think it's not possible to avoid it a 100%, unless you live on a farm and grow and prepare all your own food from scratch. I do think it's possible to significantly lower your UPF intake. I also think it's important to look at why UPF is such a problem. It typically has to do with complete UPF meals that are high in suger, high in salt, low in vitamins and mineral, low in fiber and low in protein. This means you are not giving your body what it needs.

These are all things you can massive improve by cooking (largely) from scratch. You don't have to go so far as to churn your own butter, but you get a long with with buying separate ingredients and paying attention to the labels.

Opps, sorry! 🤦🏻‍♀️

🤦🏻‍♀️ that was obviously meant to say "Talking out my ass"

I was actually replying to a comment made by someone else. 😁

Most supermarket ciabatta isn't UPF. Lots of co-op bread isn't. And Jason's sourdough isn't and is widely available and not much more expensive than other bread.

I'm not saying they are, lol, I was just giving another option for anyone that wants to avoid stock cubes. I still use them occasionally, too.

At the end of the day, people should do what works for them. If my posts have helped even 1 person to find an alternative for something they want, that's fine. If not, that's also fine.

I do what I can, but just like everyone else I'm not perfect. Could I do better,? yes. Could I do a lot worse? Definitely!

I seem to remember him saying, maybe in an MN webchat, that they were very very careful when talking about this on TV, because they didn’t want to make kids refuse to eat their meals.