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

[MyHealthyMission]

I mean ordinary as in, works full time, earns a decent but not huge wage, has free time but not entire days at a time to dedicate to cooking etc.

I'm on a bit of a health kick, and have turned my attention to eating whole foods and ensuring I'm eating as healthy as possible as we come into winter.

I've had a sourdough starter on the go for a while and decided I'd knock up some bread rolls and soup to have for lunch in the coming week because it's turned cold. Figured it would be a great, low UPF meal. Until I googled the beef stock, which is apparently a really bad UPF! Even the super expensive all natural concentrates are UPF. So unless you can afford to buy and boil a load of beef bones, it seems you're out of luck.

Obviously you can do the normal things like avoiding crisps, protein shakes etc. as they're all full of UPF, but when even things like stock cubes are stuffed full of them, it just seems impossible! AIBU to think it's just become impossible to eat a UPF free diet?

I agree but there’s a massive difference to eating well and healthily and eating almost nothing but UPF. Some people do seem to exist on absolute rubbish.

Just do your best. Having some awareness is probably your best asset.

I do agree but I'd rather (for all my sins 😅) have a treat like the occasional chocolate or bag of crisps, than have small amounts of UPF in every meal, if that makes sense? It just feels impossible

The problem is wanting to eat UPF free in the first place. If you eat a diet that high in UPFs then yes it’s not great but that doesn’t mean that the only alternative is to have none at all. You can just moderate your intake. So buy your bread, get something with whole grains and seeds in it to get more nutritional benefit and accept that it has some preservatives because that’s what allows them to sell it days after it was made.

If you need to use ready made stock in order to then get a whole load of lean high quality protein and a range of vegetables that give you vitamins, minerals and fibre then that’s fine.

Its the all or nothing approach that’s impossible to sustain.

I don’t use stock cubes. I use miso paste instead, but that is also very salty and probably classed as ultra processed too! It suits me as it has no sugar so I count that as a win.

I mean, of course a stock cube is UPF. It's a completely manufactured factory product! It can't have been a surprise!

It's literally (or it should be) dried beef stock. It says on the front it's free from artificial preservatives, so one would believe it's not a UPF!

It doesn’t have to be all or nothing. People give up if they think they can’t do it completely - it feels like a waste of time. But it’s far healthier to eat a relatively clean diet, with the odd stock cube or portion of baked beans, than it is to eat a 50% UPF diet.

It probably is impossible, but do the best you can. Why worry if the odd UPF ingredient sneaks in from time to time?

It can be really tricky, for all the reasons you mention.

Of course things like stock cubes were invented to save time and effort but obviously with little regard for their ingredients or lack of nutritional value!

Sometimes I think the standard workday needs to be shorter in order to allow us the time and space to dedicate energy to cooking well, without having to constantly be 10 steps ahead of ourselves at all times by batch-cooking and all that.

Also, I'm sure one of the big UPF studies looks at people who reduced the amount of UPF they consume (rather than eliminate) and it had significant health benefits. I might try to find it...

I think it's pretty straightforward to be almost upf-free, and just tolerate the occasional stock cube.

Yep I think for most people it's impossible. Even if you add sauces, gravies, condiments etc.

I do try to 'eat better' and buy free range and organic but even that is difficult and not always possible, never mind UPF.

My personal preference is to have a dedicated treat with UPF, as opposed to small amounts in every meal.

But is it? Who has 6 hours free to make a sourdough every few days?!

It's unrealistic for me, and I can live with that. Overall I'm reasonably healthy.

But how do you dry beef stock? You need to... process it.

Buy a bread maker.

Just make regular bread. It is far better than mass produced. Use a bread machine if you prefer.

Everything is difficult if you become a perfectionist.

There are some things that are very hard to get hold of non-UPF versions of that should be possible, stock cubes is one. However rather like vegan options, while it was a minority thing, it wasn’t well catered for, if more and more people are eating low UPF diets, there’s a market for producing and selling non or low UPF options. Stock would be a good option for food manufacturers to easily produce an alternative- especially as some of us would pay a premium for it.

Sourdough bread freezes really well, I normally make a batch of rolls & defrost them as I want them. There’s no way I’m going to faff about making my own stock though, as long as most of the ingredients in my homemade soup / ratatouille / whatever aren’t UPF I’m happy.

There’s a difference between processed food (which is everything we consume. Even digging up a potato is “processing” it) and ultra processed foods.

'Processed' is different to Ultra Processed Food.

I buy bread but do my own stock most of the time (leftover bones from a roast + leftover veg and parmesan rind that i keep in frozen tuperware until i have enough to do a load of stick which i then freeze in small container for later use)
id love to do sourcough bread but 1) all my attempt failed and 2) it is time consuming!!
i am mostly upf free but thats a way of life rather than a choice. My husband thinks it is because i am from the countryside… maybe it is, maybe it isnt.
i would love to know how to can veg and fruits like my grandmother did but i am very afraid of botulism and i work FT with 3 kids so not really realistic. Also i dont see the point to keep vegs i will buy from Sainsbury’s!
i defo have a little bit of an unrealised trad wife in me!

The amount of ingredients in a stock cube that make it a UPF will be a minuscule amount of the final dish.
You can buy plenty of pre prepared ingredients that will speed up cooking but are not UPF eg chopped frozen onions.

I don’t think you need ‘days’ to do batch cooking.

It’s 2pm and so far today I’ve done a soup, my sourdough and I’ve just got started on a jam. In a little while I’ll make a start on a beef pie filling, as well as housework and a workout. It’s time consuming.