Does anyone have a “normal” diet?

[Gogobabyshark]

Just that really, on here everyone seems to either eat a diet full of processed food or no ultra processed food and make every single item from scratch. So I wanted to know does anyone eat a “normal” not extreme diet? By that I mean cooking from scratch but also enjoying some oven food, plenty of fruit and vegetables alongside enjoying dairy milk, trying to buy healthier alternatives where liked by the family.
I feel like we do a decent job at eating well but some of these threads make me wonder

Yes. Most people are probably in the middle, but only the people at either end feel strongly enough about it to post.

This probably applies to half of the other stances you see on MN as well

THANK YOU!! Someone who understands statistics and self selecting samples.

You see it on the money threads too: everyone who posts either earns £200K or is on minimal wage 16h a week. And everyone has savings, because people who don’t don’t post…

I have no issues making sausages, mash and beans for a meal or sausage casserole to get more veg in.

Likewise chicken kievs are a favourite but I don't make them from scratch! I have no issues using a jar for bolognese either.

There's definitely a level of one upmanship on MN where everything is cooked from scratch and eating food akin to Michelan star restaurants. 🙄

Yes we eat a "normal" diet I do try and avoid somethings but in general it's just usual food,

This is exactly what I meant. We may have sausages or a pizza once a week but do cook salmon or roast dinners other days. I sometimes wonder if it’s enough

My kids have the perfect diet, mine not so much, way too much of a sugar addiction. I would avoid sausages though as they’re carcinogenic
edited to add they are four and one so I currently get to cook all their food, I imagine in ten years they will be walking to school eating a bag of haribo with everyone else

With you op. We eat a healthy diet (in my opinion). Plenty of fruit and veg. Lean meats. Home cooking. But also love a fish finger tea and only buy cows milk. I totally get people who want to have a totally non ultra processed diet but it’s not feasible with two kids and working full time (will await someone to come along and boost how easy it is 🤣)
When I win the lottery though il employ a chef to sort me out and il also grow my own veg and own a small farm to have as much home grown stuff as possible! 🤣

YANBU. My diet is very average. I eat plenty of fruit and vegetables but too much sugar. We also (gasp) sometimes have ready meals.

Yes, you've pretty much described me and my family.

Me and my DH were also raised on a 'normal' diet, where food was just food.

Nothing was 'good' or 'bad' but we'd try to get an even healthy/not so healthy mix.

Having said that, none of us or our families have ever suffered from weight problems so the word 'diet' wasn't really a much used word.

I love how people consider their own diet to be 'normal'!

There's a wide variety of diets that are all normal, ranging from heavily upf and pre-prepared to cook everything from scratch.

I'm also "normal" in this sense. We cook real food about five nights out of seven, and then maybe two meals with a bit of a cheat. Kids get typical kid snack foods like granola bars at school which I would love to do better on but I am not organized enough to improve. I try and choose a lot of natural healthy foods but I don't religiously avoid anything.

Our family diet is a mixed intake of non-UPF and cooked from scratch foods/meals, plus plenty of UPF and convenience food mixed in; I love Pepsi Max and protein bars between meals, for example. Works for us! Consistency not perfection is my mantra.

I think I’m pretty normal, this is what we’ve had since Saturday.
Sat - rump steak, oven chips, salad and shop bought Coleslaw.
Sunday - roast chicken dinner, new potatoes, steamed veg.
Monday - Spag bol, I just used passata and veg as the sauce with added streaky diced bacon.
Tuesday - prawn curry - I used a jar of sauce. Even my rice was a pouch one.
Wednesday - Slow cooker beef/veg stew with frozen mash - I used a Colemans sachet for the sauce.

I'd call mine 'privileged normal for 2025 uk'. We eat a lot of fresh stuff, we grow a few veg, but we don't make our own bread, we eat white rice and pasta, we use jar stuff like pesto and a lot of tinned ingredients. We also eat Quorn which must be the ultimate upf.

Don't believe everything you read on MN. Smoke and mirrors!

Me, I eat somewhere in the middle. Some days are all home cooked and others are whatever’s in the freezer with a few frozen peas for balance!
And once a week I have a Macdonalds breakfast ( that’s a sin on here)

Yes, I think I have a "normal" diet for a middle class older woman in the UK. I'm still 2 stone overweight though .

I cook from scratch mainly and I buy things to heat up from M&S sometimes.
I eat two meals a day. I use butter, semi skimmed milk, I drink about 3 or 4 coffees/teas per day. I generally get my 5 a day as I have fruit, fresh veg or salad every day.

I don't habitually eat puddings, cakes, pastries, biscuits, sweets or chocolate. They are an occasional treat.

I go out to dinner about once a month and have a takeaway about every 2 or 3 months. Never set foot in Maccies, KFC or any of the other fast food places.

I think I'm absolutely average and the 2 stone additional flab is sadly also probably perfectly average for someone of my age.

First post nails as often does 😂

80/20% split here - during the week, it's all pretty healthy and get our 5 a day - weekends not so much.

My diet ranges from spicy cheetos to daily kimchi and kefir, and all in between.

I literally eat everything. Ex-chef though so I probably have a broader than usual interest in food and big/weird flavours.

Most people, probably. People on the extreme ends of anything are more likely to post about it, which makes it seem that everyone is like that. I eat a normal diet. Judging by what my friends, family and colleagues eat, so do they.

I think we are normal. We eat lots of veg, homemade spag bol, curry, shepherds pie, pies etc. I like sourdough bread, avocado and Greek yoghurt, nuts, seeds etc so on that side of the spectrum I would day really healthy.

BUT on the other side we get a Chinese takeaway, KFC occasionally, and we love chocolate and usually have it every night after dinner, I have just polished off a wispa.

I think that's pretty normal.

Yes. I’m not particularly food motivated and I don’t have a sweet tooth, which keeps me on the straight and narrow in terms of usually eating plain, simple stuff like meat and fish and eggs and vegetables and hummus and nuts a lot; so I don’t sweat the chicken nuggets and tinned spaghetti hoops I also have a penchant for.

I don’t know a single person who’s as militant about UPFs as some of the MN threads I read about it. And I certainly couldn’t invest as much energy into watching every single thing I eat as that.

Most of us are somewhere in the middle and too busy muddling along with work kids and life to be posting here about UPFs..

tonight mid week dinner was make your own wraps - DH grilled some chicken breast with garlic and curry spices, I cut up some veg and made up garlic yoghurt but then stuffed these into wraps (UPFs!) I reckon we shall survive!

I'd say I have a normal diet

Some uof, but lots of stuff cooked from scratch

Eat meat, alcohol, processed bread etc