To ask what highly processed food you eat?

[Lifeswhatyoumakeit73]

I haven’t read the Dr Chris book yet about highly processed food but I have read other stuff & it’s made me super conscious of how much HPF we eat. I cook mainly from scratch but as a family of 3 pescatarians & me who is mainly plant based but eats eggs, I realise I need to look at what we eat & make some changes. I cook from scratch as much as I can but I am a busy mum who works full time so we do reply on some HPF. Looking in my cupboards:

We have:

• baked beans
• veggie sausages
• veggie mince
• oat milk
• vegan cheese
• vegan butter
• Tacos
• crackers, crisps, bread sticks
• shop bought houmous
• shreddies, weetabix
• caramel wafers
• yoyos
• couple tins veggie chilli
• peanut butter (whole earth so just peanuts but still bad apparently)
• jam
• seeded bread sliced
• bagels

How bad is that? How does it compare to others? I use veggie mince to make a spag Bol from scratch but will, for example, use lentils instead.

i feel like most of our food is cooked fresh but judging by this list, we have a lot of processed crap that I hadn’t registered.

Aibu to ask you to share so I can compare?

I’ve just finished the Dr Chris book. Oooh it was a bit of a slog, but also an eye opener.

The message of the book was that there are several ingredients in ultra processed foods that simply are not food at all, but are an ingredient serving a purpose. For example, a by-product of the coal industry that adds a sweetened taste. Usually they are non-food chemicals that replace foods that have been removed, such as sugar. There was also a lot about emulsifiers. The book is peppered with studies where these non food chemicals were given to mice and they didn’t fare well (mainly cancer or internal bleeding).

The message I took from the book was: check the ingredients on everything; if there is an ingredient that you couldn’t have in your kitchen then you should not consume the food.

What's wrong with oat milk?

You’re so wrong - Science ain’t on your side with this. And neither is a sense of humanity or compassion either.

@Woodywoods
i loved the book but the message I took was slightly different in that to be aware and avoid. He gives his children UPF and speaks of ice creams on family days out.
I don’t think his message is all or nothing just of balance and awareness.

Apparently Weetabix is ultra processed because of some of the ingredients. I felt a bit guilty for giving my baby some the other day, but then I realised I needed to stop being obsessive about it- it’s still much less processed and full of crap than say, cheerios or chocolate cereal.

I also can’t see how things like fruit yo-yos (ingredients are just fruit) are UPF. Processed, yes, because they are dried. But no added ingredients. Ready Brek was recommended for babies to me because of the finer nature of it than porridge oats and because it’s fortified. Is that UPF?! I really don’t know.

I think for us it’s going to be aiming for 70/30. We already cook mostly from scratch for our main meals but then even that, say I do a stir fry, the noodles might count as UPF and the sauce definitely would.

Home made oat milk is fine, but almost all the the supermarket ones are are full of non-food additives like emulsifiers, gums and artificial sweeteners that are markers of UPFs.

This is a really useful website for gauging which foods are UPF or not: https://world.openfoodfacts.org/nova

That page links to the four different classifications (unprocessed/minimally processed, processed ingredients, processed foods, ultra processed foods) but there’s a search bar at the top.

@lowlythirdremove thank you, I get the Momo one I need to check it....

@maybein2022 on the Nova website, neither Weetabix (the standard version) nor Yo-Yos are ultra processed.

Another one here who has not read the book but heard a lengthy radio interview and discussion - UPF is more than 5 ingredients and particularly things you wouldn't find in a standard kitchen - emulsifiers, modified starch, chemical compounds etc - the example given was the standard lunch "meal deal" - look at the ingredients on the sandwich! Look at how they make quavers! The drink and its sweeteners, flavourings and colourants

I also recall reading a while ago about additives not required to be included on lists of ingredients, such as the "coating" on pre-cut packaged fruit to stop it from discolouring or going soft, or chemicals used to rinse bagged salads.

It's so hard to avoid but the more attention we pay to labels, the more likely we are to understand what we are putting in our (and our children's ) bodies.

None

@GrannyWeatherwaxsHatpin thank you. I’ll have a look at the website.

@floradora re fruit, oh that is not good. We are guilty of sometimes buying pre packaged fruit- trying to cut it out because of the plastic and environmental impact but had no idea it had ‘coatings’ on it.

I prefer eating vegan/vegetarian processed foods (I eat these occasionally) over a mash up of eyes, lips and arseholes that is a Fray Bentos pie/cheap sausages etc.

Not all processed foods are the same level as processed as each other.

This UPF thing is…another excuse as to why the majority of the country is now overweight/obese.

What if it’s not an excuse but the reason? Obesity levels suddenly soared in the 80s (I think, might have been the late 70s) - what caused that to happen? Could it be anything to do with the sudden proliferation of “low fat” foods which would probably be defined as UPFs today?

And if it IS the reason, then shouldn’t we be doing something about the idea that manufacturers can create foods which are deliberately designed to bypass our satiety mechanisms so we just keep eating, never mind the biological effects these ingredients have on our bodies? Why would it be OK to claim that obesity is due to laziness/lack of willpower/whatever if people are being sold food that comes with a halo of healthiness (“High fibre!” “Added vitamins!” “Low fat!”) but which is practically designed to make them fat?

I switched away from a largely processed diet 4 months ago and was shocked how the fat fell off without much effort. I used to feel constantly hungry throughout the day now I don't ever feel the need to snack and have so much more energy. Vegatables taste so much nicer to me than they used to. I think ultra processed food is like an addiction and once you get over it you feel so much better.

Unfortunately though my children are still addicted so I am gradually trying to wean them off the worst ultra processed foods. It is quite shocking when you read the research on what harm it is doing to your body. There was some research linking the amount of processed food in different countries to the level of obesity which was quite revealing.

I'd actually be quite interested in the answer to "when" @GrannyWeatherwaxsHatpin I would have said 90s was the time people began to get overweight as a more general issue. Certainly not 70s in any case.

UPF is more than 5 ingredients

No, that’s not a definition. It can be an indicator but to take, say, the example of a cake which contains butter, salt, sugar, eggs, flour and lemon zest, there’s more than 5 ingredients but they’re all non-UPF. The resultant cake wouldn’t be UPF either.

there is a difference between Ultra Processed Food and processed food

processed, breads, tinned, cheese, tofu - they have been altered but not in a way that is bad for you

UPF is food chocolate, hot dogs, breakfast cereal, fizzy pop, packets of soup, pot noddles - these are highly manipulated foods that have many added ingredients

Here is the research linking processed foods to obesity by country. The UK fares worst
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/28714422/
Across the nineteen countries, median average household availability amounted to 33·9 % of total purchased dietary energy for unprocessed or minimally processed foods, 20·3 % for processed culinary ingredients, 19·6 % for processed foods and 26·4 % for ultra-processed foods. The average household availability of ultra-processed foods ranged from 10·2 % in Portugal and 13·4 % in Italy to 46·2 % in Germany and 50·4 % in the UK. A significant positive association was found between national household availability of ultra-processed foods and national prevalence of obesity among adults. After adjustment for national income, prevalence of physical inactivity, prevalence of smoking, measured or self-reported prevalence of obesity, and time lag between estimates on household food availability and obesity, each percentage point increase in the household availability of ultra-processed foods resulted in an increase of 0·25 percentage points in obesity prevalence.

I mentioned bananas, I listed it because it's one of the few non PF I had today.

I'm not fat nor do I have MS. What other bad thing is supposed to have happened to me from eating UPF?

There are also links between injestion of UPF and cancer and alzheimer's
https://www.bmj.com/content/360/bmj.k322

https://pathwayshealth.org/hospice-topics/the-possible-role-processed-foods-play-in-alzheimers/

I can’t find the original article I found on it, it was a number of years ago and perhaps I didn’t bookmark it. But there’s reference to it in the 11th paragraph of this article: https://www.theguardian.com/society/2016/apr/07/the-sugar-conspiracy-robert-lustig-john-yudkin The original article was about Robert Lustig’s book, I think. Will keep looking!

I think I get the balance about right. I eat some UPF but avoid a lot that I used to eat. I made an effort to cut out bought pies, pastries, sausage, breakfast cereals, bacon and ready meals about 6 months ago. I used to eat a lot of sausage rolls for lunch, now I have egg or tuna.
Ds is veggie and eats lots of crap fake meat which I hate. When he comes home I cook veggie meals with lentils and pulses which he eats but of course it's more effort.

What I still eat are crisps and chocolate. I draw the line at giving them up.