This UPF thing is irritating me

[SnowMoss]

I've never eaten much UPF, but it is getting harder and harder to avoid it. I don't go the whole 9 yards or anything, but try to keep myself informed and do my best to eat a healthy balanced diet.

Made a good effort to keep an eye on upf's, so for the past year have been sourcing good poultry, fish, and eating it with vegetables, etc. But I am bored out of my mind at this point! Just so fucking bored.

Then I hear about seed oils, so now even the small things that I added, such as mayo, gnocchi, the occasional flatbread (contains only sunflower oil, salt, wheat) are seen as a UPF too, due to the inclusion of sunflower or rapeseed oil. I am happy with and have the time to cook from scratch, but avoiding oils has basically taken a good whack at my time.
It's one thing trying to get people to eat a good diet, with veg and fruit and less processed meats, which will benefit their health, weight and wellbeing, but I am honest to god fed up of eating meat and a pile of veg, even if my own sauces and seasonings suffice.
And no, nothing substitutes for mayo! And no, I really don't want to make my own! I will make my own pesto, coleslaw, stuff like that, but I am bone bloody weary of avoidance.

Surely just being mindful is enough? I get that the food industry is an unregulated cesspit right now, but I am beginning to wonder just how awful it is, in moderation, to eat a some.
Sadly if I google any kind of additive or seed oil, I get lists of 'side effects' such as bloating, calcium loss and so on, it is so depressing.

If you are mindful of UPF's have you found a good balance?

Yes, I notice this too. There are too many stereotypical presumptions, it's even worse at the Guardian! All poor people eat bad food, etc. It simply isn't true.

But there a definitely class cultural differences in how we approach it. I do think that a lot of the 'you are obsessive' posts are very reminiscent of tabloid attitudes to life in general - attempts to humiliate someone for voicing a concern. That is something that I have noticed has a class connection.

I think the food anxieties are much worse than eating some UPFs, even if something every day.

I'd hazard a guess that anxiety generally is worse. Of all the people I know who are ultra careful about what they eat and reading the small print of food labels, they are invariably the ones with the most days off ill due to colds etc.

What IS important, however, is to stay a healthy weight and lose weight if you put on weight around your middle.

The Crosta and Mollica pizza bases are good (frozen section). I can get these from Ocado, Sainsburys and Waitrose. I love there wraps too but agree they shouldn't be called flatbreads

so it doesn't necessarily follow that less well off = poor diet

It doesn't outside of UK in many, many places. If anything it's the poor who cook from scratch. I grew up in CE and no way could we afford things like premade schnitzel, ready meals etc. Ready meals still have like 1 small area and bit pricey, but they are getting in now more people live by themselves I guess. Not cheap though. My family were mesmerised by UK supermarket with shelves and shelves or ready meals.

(talking about absolute poverty on or near a homeless level, they would have tinned meals iften so not great diet at all, but that is an absolute poverty, not MN poverty)

Just for the record, nowhere in my OP did I say I had any kind of anxiety about food At all.
I said I had made an attempt to cut UPF and it was irritating, a bit boring, and that I was confused by the messaging.

Hope that helps!

I have never before accused anyone of having poor mental health on here and I even acknowledged that where I see it done it is usually snarky rather than out of genuine concern.

Your post said explicitly that this subject is consuming a large amount of time and headspace daily and is even spoiling your enjoyment of food. Of course I don't know exactly how often you google but I don't think I'm being dramatic to infer from the context that it could be quite frequently!

As for having nothing worthwhile to say on the subject, I directly addressed the subject matter/question in the rest of my post based on my personal thoughts/experiences.

I'm really not looking to argue so no need to reply to me again, I just felt your reply to me was a bit kneejerk.

But so many people on this thread are saying they disagree with you, and haven't told you we are working class. Why do you think we are working class?!

Middle class people can afford to eat better, it is true. It does not follow that middle class people overthink their food more. I do not think there is a class divide on this issue.

I think it is more of a critical reader vs uncritical reader issue.

Food neurosis is food neurosis. Doubt it is a class/cultural divide. Though the over-analysing and hypervigilance over a seed oils might be more a middle-class activity.

It is quite tiresome. But OP should nonetheless feel free to crack on because in her mind, this is normal behaviour.

A small amount of butter is fine- like a teaspoon a day.

The recommended amount I'm seeing from nutritionists is 1-2 tablespoons a day max.

Yawn

Here we go, I will try again.
I said food attitude and beliefs are class/cultural, not mental health issues.
It is common for some people to discuss, concern themselves, with nutrition. To call that a mental health issues shows a lack of tolerance and likely education.

My in-laws are about to turn 90 and are in good health and all they’ve eaten for decades is UPFs, they are proud of the fact they don’t eat vegetables and have never eaten salad. Their diet consists of white breads, sugary cereal, sugary tea, fry-ups, red meats and the only veg they will eat is Smash instant potato. I know it’s only anecdotal, but for me it makes me not give too much thought to UPFs.

I think stress is a bigger killer than food, and you are creating a lot of stress for yourself worrying so much about it.

I think a big part of the problem is that there is no one agreed definition of what consistutes a UPF so it means different things to different people

The jury is not out on saturated fat and CVD, there is a clear association that has been described in the scientific literature for decades. Of course excess sugar is also a problem, it doesn’t have to be either or. And a small amount of butter is fine, of course, as is a small amount of most foods. But some of the posters above are replacing all their “evil poisonous seed oils” with butter, ghee and coconut fat in their cooking, every day, which I would wager is a lot more than a teaspoon every now and then. There is a lot of evidence to suggest this is misguided.

I'd hazard a guess that anxiety generally is worse. Of all the people I know who are ultra careful about what they eat and reading the small print of food labels, they are invariably the ones with the most days off ill due to colds etc.

Really?!! Okaaaaay

Reading every label, spending ages researching, massively restricting your diet, feeling anxiety about eating "the wrong things" can absolutely become an obsession and it's ridiculous to pretend it can't. This is more a comment on how some people in general get sucked down the rabbit hole btw, not necessarily @SnowMoss .

There's using common sense and actively avoiding eating too much of certain types of food/ingredients and there's getting properly worked up about eating a pita bread.

I also think a lot of the narrative around it really plays into women's/mothers guilt and just piles more pressure on.

See also wheat.
we are eating Far far too much of it every day of every year for most people!

Stick blender mayo made in minutes with organic eggs and olive oil. Smidge of mustard, salt and garlic.

Game changer.

There is new data and research around saturated fat. It’s not as clear cut as it’s bad for you heart as has been the trope for the past 60 years.
Processed saturated fat is not the same as unprocessed.
www.healthline.com/nutrition/saturated-fat#is-it-unhealthy

This sounds like a mild symptom of health anxiety disguised as irritation. We have been consuming UPF for a long time, and yet people's lifespans have actually increased. The concerns raised about UPF consumption are more about striving to live longer and healthier lives rather than fearing that it will kill us.

I am quite committed to avoiding UPFs - I'm vegan which IMO is even harder haha.

But I do think that it's really hard to avoid ALL seed oils in shop-made things - i tend to let it go in things like humous (tho M&S do a mainly EVOO version), the occasional packet of crisps, and vegan mayo.

It isn't that hard to avoid seed oils in cooking - have you tried peanut/groundnut? Or avocado if you're flush. I use EVOO for lots of things, Lidl/Aldi is cheapest.

wraps - Crosta and Mollica are great and no monodyglicerides or gums

Plenish soy milk - nothing added, unlike most plant milks

No supermarket bread apart from Jasons

I am not surprised by this.

People who are afraid of what they put into their bodies would be more likely to be afraid of what is outside their bodies i.e. dirt and germs. It is the hygiene paradox. Neurosis or anxiety in one area of life bleeds into another.

It's the hydrogenated aspect of seed oils that are the problem for our poor cells.

Olive, sunflower and canola oils aren't hydrogenated when they're in liquid form. They're only hydrogenated when they've been altered to be solid at room temperature.

It doesn't take a genius or a total puritan to eat ok ish.

It really is common sense. However many are time and/or cash poor so it's easier to buy off the shelf/fridge/pre packaged etc. I know this, mea culpa in the past.

It's much easier now that I live alone, and I hold my hand up there. So what if I have a yogurt that contains sweetener, or hellman's mayo, or some ice cream whatever, that's not going to kill me to have it now and then.

I'm beginning to feel that all the lecturing, diet advice, admonishments, warnings etc. about food and its dangers are making people stressed and worried about what they and their families are eating. The enjoyment of cooking and eating is now surrounded by worry. Sad isn't it? Vicious circle there I think.

I think it means avoiding mostly obvious junk food, such as fast food, ready made meals, snacks, pastry and soda. If you cook from scratch (with or without seed oils), you should be fine.

Why are we demonising seed oils? Obviously too much of any fat is a bad thing, and there are a lot of fats hidden in food manufacturing. However for home cooking I thought rapeseed was actually quite a good thing, no? I have been switching over to rapeseed oil for cooking because of the Omega 3 content amongst other reasons. I use virgin olive oil, but it's just not ideal for cooking due to its low smoking point, so it depends what I'm making. For some things I prefer butter (baking), coconut oil (curries), a tiny dash of sesame oil mixed with rapeseed for stir fries for the nutty flavour...

The main thing is not too much of the stuff isn't it?

The British Heart Foundation is actually fairly praising about rapeseed oil