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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To hate it when people label food "healthy"

69 replies

Sazzas · 19/09/2015 16:20

Because it really isn't that simple that a food is either healthy or unhealthy. So many different factors to consider.

For instance many people claimed on another thread that factory made sushi, factory prepared fruit and a bottle of pop was "healthy".

The sushi contains white rice that has been sugared and salted with only a tiny amount of veg, but lots of Mayo in comparison. The fruit will have been made in a factory a week ago, dipped in chlorine and packaged with special gasses to prevent it from looking degraded but it will have lost lots of its nutritional content. A bottle of pop usually just contains a huge amount of your daily calories from sugar. So I wouldn't consider this meal either healthy or unhealthy. Probaby 95% unhealthy a d 5% healthy. Lots of sugar and processed carbs.

OP posts:
Thefitfatty · 20/09/2015 07:07

YABU about everything except the pop. While it's nice to be able to have unprocessed foods, surely sushi and fruit (especially fruit) are healthier then, say, a Big Mac and chips?

I really can't stand people who label anything that's been processed as unhealthy. It makes it very difficult for people who are struggling to eat healthy but don't have the money for organic foods.

TheHouseOnTheLane · 20/09/2015 07:43

Sushi doesn't have mayo! And the OP said "juice" not "pop"

ThursdayLastWeek · 20/09/2015 07:50

I can see the word pop twice in the OP

ThursdayLastWeek · 20/09/2015 07:50

Or do you mean the thread that the thread is about actually?
Sorry!

Original poster
Sazzas · 20/09/2015 07:53

Most supermarket sushi does have Mayo and the other thread said soft drink not juice, I'm being more specific and calling it pop here.

OP posts:
Thefitfatty · 20/09/2015 07:55

Maki sushi might have a mayo-type sauce. But nigiri sushi and sashimi doesn't.

MrsMook · 20/09/2015 08:31

As a general observation, healthy tends to be misapplied to foods that aren't that healthy, like 0% fat yoghurts that are mainly starch and sweetners when a real yoghurt isn't bad anyway. On that level YANBU.

Your examples are unreasonable. There's a decent amount of nutrition in there, more than in many lunches.

I'm trying to think of food in terms of its nutritional value and what macro and micro nutrients it's providing. Keeping that in mind and eating something different most days should mean that on balance most of my body's needs are met and I'm in a decent state of health.

Demonising food is not helpful.

FuzzyWizard · 20/09/2015 08:52

I sort of agree that foods taken in isolation are not healthy or unhealthy. I disagree with you about sushi though. What's wrong with white rice. Most Japanese people eat white rice every day, often more than once a day. They seem to be very healthy compared to Westerners. I buy pre packaged sushi every so often... Very few of the ones I buy have Mayo in.
You could eat sushi for lunch every day an be perfectly healthy or you could eat sushi for lunch every day and have an awful diet. It depends what else you eat the rest of the time. A few decades ago lots of people took a sandwich and a bag of crisps or an apple for lunch every single day. Some were healthy and some not so much. One (moderately healthy) meal a day doesn't tell you much about how healthy someone is overall. Picking apart foods nitpicking over the individial ingredients in a perfectly fine meal is silly.

FuzzyWizard · 20/09/2015 08:57

Ok... But take a tesco sushi selection. In the medium and large selections there is ONE tuna mayo maki. None of the other pieces have Mayo. That piece contains about a teaspoon of tuna mayonnaise... So about 1/4 of a teaspoon of mayo. Are you really telling me that that amount of mayo is doing anyone any harm?

Oysterbabe · 20/09/2015 09:02

What's so wrong with mayo anyway?

I like sushi Had and think it's healthier than most pre-packed sandwiches if you're looking for a supermarket lunch.

herethereandeverywhere · 20/09/2015 09:04

It's all relative isn't it?

It's a damn sight healthier than fried chicken and chips with a can of coke but not as healthy as steamed fish bought direct from the fisherman and a side of veg that you grew on your own allotment.

For some people it's about what's achievable:
sushi = carb variety and a meal off wheat/potatoes
packed fruit salad = makes fruit more interesting (so more likely to eat) than an apple on its own. Also more convenient and less waste (compared to buying a whole melon/pineapple/bunch of grapes etc and having to eat them all before they go off)

They can fit it into their busy lifestyle and it's not going to make them gain weight in itself (total calories will be average for a lunch).

Empty calories in the form of a drink aren't ideal but if it's something someone enjoys against a backdrop of relatively sensible eating, it's fine. The extremes of food junk and food virtue means we've also forgotten that food is one of life's great pleasures - it's ok to consume something for pure enjoyment!

OwlinaTree · 20/09/2015 09:14

What would you suggest is a healthy lunch then op? Salad and chicken? Too much mayo, no complex carbs. Tuna salad sandwich? High in mercury. Carton of soup? Could be high in salt, lot in protein. I could go on. Basically you can see the negatives in any meal.

Eating healthily is about a balance across a week, not making absolutely every meal completely balanced in every way.

I don't say this very often, but you need to let this go and eat your lunch somewhere else!

OwlinaTree · 20/09/2015 09:15

Low in protein not lot of protein.

lljkk · 20/09/2015 10:36

I love mayo.
Fruit leathers are factory made.
Agree with some of principles in OP.

BabyGanoush · 20/09/2015 11:51

What's wrong with mayo indeed

Frequency · 20/09/2015 12:13

Mayo is just egg yolks, oil and vinegar/lemon juice, sometimes mustard.

All of these things are fine in a balanced diet and still fine in a balanced diet once mixed together to make mayo.

If you have concerns, make your own at home, it's very easy. I've made small amounts of mayo when I've gone to make tuna mayo and found that DC2 has eaten all of the mayo (she likes dipping lettuce in it and eats it as a treat, she is a strange child in many ways, this is one of her more normal habits)

It's a relatively high fat/calorie content for a fairly low amount of nutrition, but in moderation is fine.

If you make your own you could use different oils to ad to the nutrition content if you wanted to.

SarfEast1cated · 20/09/2015 14:01

Crikey Sazza you're rather fixated on the subject of sushi - are you employed by the Sandwich Marketing Board?

OneDay103 · 20/09/2015 14:12

You need a bit more of a life , SAzza. Why are you so obsessed about all this. Go out, get some fresh air.

lastqueenofscotland · 20/09/2015 14:13

I try and stuck to the produce not products rule.... U till I get back from long runs and go and buy three pain au chocolate Grin

It's not exactly crap crap though is it? Guy I work with goes to kfc/McDonald's everday for lunch. Sometimes a maccies breakfast too.

Healthy eating, esp if you aren't a confident cooking can be tricky.

Live and let live. Everything people seem to have conflicting opinions go running its good for you don't go running you'll trash your knees. Eat fruit its got xyz in it don't eat fruit there's sugar in it. Blah blah fuckung blah.

NaughtToThreeSadOnions · 20/09/2015 16:14

Is it the sushi or your colleuge you have a problem with.

I agree with you about healthy diets as I did the levels if waste wrapping but you hid the other thread because people were getting annoyed with you and I'm not saying their answers were right but don't you think your going to get the same answers on here because this isn't aboug waste or healthy diet this all aimed at one person!

What he eats for lunch is absultely non of your business, your salad from your veg box May to him be "unhealthy" it's got no protien for example. It's even less of your business than how much waste packaging he's creating is!

Yes pop contains large amounts of sugar can cause health problems but he's a grown adult!

Are you going to start another thread about sushi and Pop when people tell you to stop on this thread too!

OddlyLogical · 20/09/2015 16:21

I like sushi :)

Blondie1984 · 20/09/2015 16:22

Sazza I think you need to just let it go...placing this much focus,attention and energy on it is not healthy
With regards to your colleague, you don't know what the rest of his lifestyle is like - and whilst his lunch might not gain the approval of Amelia Freer, Ella Woodward or similar, it is arguably healthier than him having a steak bake, bottle of coke and jam doughnut from Gregg's

Please please do not pass your fixation on to your children

redredblue · 20/09/2015 16:41

Healthy is natural, unprocessed food.
It's good to eat a variety to make up a balanced diet.
So pineapple is healthy, a diet consisting entirely of pineapple is not healthy.

redredblue · 20/09/2015 16:44

Regular crisps, sweets, fizzy drinks, etc, are unhealthy and no matter what anyone says I won't be convinced otherwise.
But can be included in a healthy diet in small amounts.

MrsHathaway · 20/09/2015 16:46

I hate foods being labelled add healthy or unhealthy and far prefer to talk in terms of being nutritious or not.