What it's really like trying to minimise UPFs - expectation v reality

[StiffyByngsDogBartholomew]

I've been trying to minimise UPFs for 6 months or maybe a bit more. We always had a very homemade diet anyway and weren't exactly starting from eating ready meals or jarred sauces.

i used to be a pastry chef, i trained in all areas of the kitchen. Im a really good cook, can make pretty much anything from breads and croissants to jams and fancy sauces. We have a decent food budget of £450 a month for 3 and while I work full time I have a shift which gives me plenty of time at home. I love cooking.

But even given all the above I'm bloody sick to death of it and I've started buying premade food like coleslaw again. I've just got totally exhausted constantly having to think of everything in advance and make everything. Eg if I want to make chicken and mushroom pie I need to make the flaky pastry and to make a gravy or white sauce. Packed lunches and breakfasts are much more difficult or expensive. I've either got to make the bread for the toast myself or pay a small fortune for bakery bread.

Constant arguments over not buying pappy sliced bread and household revolts over not buying flavoured crisps, Pringles, gravy powder, bars of chocolate, cheap ice cream, or cheap squash.

ive tried so hard to make sure everything we were eating was wholesome but its so bloody hard. Even starting from a very low threshold of UPFs and still including some I just can't be bothered.

some examples...
you want avocado on toast for breakfast - got to make the bread or buy it

want a hash brown on your full English - got to have sautés instead or make hash browns that do not taste anything like the same, however good a cook you are

burger and chips for a Saturday night now means you've got to make your own burger buns and chipped potatoes or wedges. Want onion rings with it ? Yeah they won't be a patch on the ones you buy in the freezer section.

no quick dinner options like a pizza from the reduced counter in the supermarket

want a curry ? Make it all from scratch including the naan bread, mango chutney etc

want a bit of something sweet to have after the packed lunch non upf pasta salad that you made homemade honey and mustard mayonnaise dressing for ? Gotta make it yourself.

the only yoghurts you can eat are plain with some fruit added. That's nice to start with but after a while the thought of a black cherry yoghurt was too much to resist

spend hours at the beginning of the month prepping pastries, curry sauce bases, wontons for wonton soup

want a quick pudding ? What are you going to have ? Oh yeah, nothing. you've had to make it beforehand or wait for it to cook. A quick bowl of ice cream or a lolly is out unless you've had to take out a second mortgage to buy it. Or made it yourself.

nothing is quick. It requires either vast amounts of time to make foods to replace takeaways, cake, bread, ice creams etc even if you decide that you can't actually cut the UPFs entirely. And unless your family is 100% on board you will be fighting a losing battle. You seem to spend your entire life thinking about, buying, making and clearing up food.

the takeaway from it is that I will still avoid emulsifiers wherever possible and do my best but I just can't keep fighting this battle to the level I've tried, it's just unsustainable.

Is mango chutney a UPF? If UPF is defined as 'containing ingredients you wouldn't use at home', then I don't think so? Ditto hash browns.

I think making absolutely everything from scratch is an overly onerous task. But if you're happy to go without some things (easier said than done when trying to alter the diet of kids/teenagers who are used to crisps/ice cream, etc.!) and accept processed food, it's not so hard to swerve UPFs.

Sounds like you're doing a great job, anyway!

@QuantumPanic to be fair I've always made my own mango chutney so that's probably a bad example
commercial hash browns are deffo upf as they usually have gums and stabilisers

Agree with this - hash browns are probably fine unless you are totally avoiding seed oils?
Mango chutney I would think would be fine shop bought too though there are probably better and worse brands!

Where are you buying them? McCains and Tesco own brand both look ok.

we are on the same journey.

some things we rely on:

Crosta and mollica do some very low processed breads/pizza bases/crispy flatbreads (just flour and olive oil and salt etc) - my kids love one of those with melted cheese and a few grapes/berries/cucumber slice for breakfast

Jason’s breads (not all but most) are very simple recipes.

We are focussed on avoiding emulsifiers and rapeseed oil/vegetable oils.

Have found a few brands of mayonnaise (hunter gather etc) without nasties. They take getting used to but I could never go back to Helmans.

Montezuma chocolate buttons/ other organic chocolate without soya lecithin/emulsifiers etc. expensive but we portion them out. They’re a treat.

YEO valley organic vanilla ice cream is made of just sugar cream milk etc.
melt some 85% dark choc and cream as a hot sauce for special dessert.

plain Kettle brand crisps (lightly salted… think they have vegetable oil but no other crap)

then we batch cook. Big time. 2 times a month ideally.
I’ll buy 2-3kg of potatoes and make 10 freezer box portions of mash with butter and milk.
Lots of slow cook meat recipes. I bought an extra slow cooker so I could make big chicken/beef casseroles/bolognese to portion up and freeze.

We do chicken soups from every left over Sunday lunch and get a few freezer portions from that too
(husband does those very well).

We are a family of four and the kids have accepted the changes we’ve been making. They don’t mind that pudding nowadays is probably porridge with full fat Greek yoghurt and some berries/banana or some toast with Jam. Or pancakes made with gluten free oats and egg and banana and cinnamon ( made in batches to freeze). Homemade ginger biscuits.flapjacks etc
Or a few kallo organic dark choc rice cakes.

…and then sometimes if we are out or as a real treat they get whatever they want… but 90% of what we buy/stock/offer/consume is very clean - meat/veg/low or no processed food. We allow a few things…
ketchup marmite cranberry/mint sauces/stocks and gravy made with organic stock cubes.

And we make time to put together snacks that will nourish the children. Protein. Lower carb than most. Raw veg and cheese cubes and fruit in a Tupperware when I collect them after school or clubs…it used to be crappy crisps/biscuits.

They gobble up whatever I bring so I try to get the good stuff in.

waffle waffle…. Just wanted to list a few of the things we’ve been enjoying if it helps anyone.

It's easy once you get used to what you can and can't buy. You also might have to spend a bit more. I only checked a few things in the fridge just now, but I can't see what's wrong with Sharwood's mango chutney, or Crosta and Mollica pizzas?

You can't eat exactly the same things as you did before obviously, you stopped eating them for a reason, so stop trying to replicate cheap ready meals. The children will soon get used to it.

I think there's definitely an art to making it feasible in your lifestyle! Part of it is knowing which shop bought things are ok by getting good at reading labels and part is choosing wisely the UPFs that give the greatest convenience for lowest percentage in your diet.

For example, there are quite a few mango chutneys that I would rate as non-UPF. I allow crisps that are recognisably slices of potato but not the reconstituted type, which allows plenty of variety. Posh squash with sugar in is pretty low UPF. I have found a puff pastry in ocado that's just butter, flour and salt, and keep a stock of that in the freezer. Have you tried the Delia recipe for quick flaky pastry btw? Most bought natural yoghurt is fine. Naked Roots veggie burgers are popular and while there are a lot of ingredients there aren't any glaringly UPF additions. And with a fussy pescatarian son who loves gravy I can't do without quorn and bisto, but they're a small portion of the diet. Finally I don't batch cook as such but I do make double quantities of most things either for another meal that week or for the freezer.

Automation is also vital. I'd say a bread maker is very very useful - not just for delicious almost-effortless bread, but it makes naans, pizza bases, pittas and wraps much easier (we'd be willing to compromise on buying those but they're so much better homemade!). We also have an ice cream maker which is brilliant and gives us a permanent stock of delicious desserts.

Pesto is one of the easiest things to make, though, as long as you have a food processor ( pestle and mortar 😩) . Two cloves of garlic ( don’t have to peel, just chop the root end off) packet of basil or parsley ( obviously two handfuls if you grow it) ground almonds and some olive oil ; just whizz it up. It’s an easy meal in our house.

I don’t make everything

Bread - I buy loaf from bakery. I usually make naan/ cakes/ roti, but not bread

i just buy decent chutneys or sauces. No way do I have time to Make ketchup

I try and alternate what needs making. Ie week 1 I might make curry, but when I make roti I always make double. So often I make curry, and have roti from freezer. Or I make roti the following week and get a curry out freezer.

Greek yogurt I like. We just eat with vanilla or honey. And cashews often. I use the same Greek yogurt to make raita for curry or tzatziki so it means streamline shipping is far easier.

If we have burger and chips, I will make burger, oven bake some chips or wedges both with skins on, so easier. Would just do fried onions if we wanted, not faff with onion rings.

Never made a hash brown. Breakfast would just not include them.

Pie - always make as we live abroad and they don’t no pie exists. I just make shortcrust or buy puff pastry though. The puff pastry from supermarket fridge isn’t up here

@UnaOfStormhold yes it's delia's I use. If I make a pie with shortcrust it's usually met with disappointment hence I make 2lb of that recipe at a time and freeze it in blocks.

If your in uk, picard puff pastry is just flour, butter, water and salt. Use when you can’t be bothered

www.ocado.com/products/picard-puff-pastry-558590011?srsltid=AfmBOoq0URl26krqZ01_bNEOAD09y0dZ26beYoLyUs1lLHzaz2xoJOeH

I just buy the best available if I need a break and a ready meal. It's expensive but worth it. So somewhere like Cook, who only use ingredients you would use yourself, in your own kitchen, no weird stuff.

Pesto is one of the easiest things to make

It is, but CBA. Just buy a good quality one. Same as made at home. Therefore the same process as you are doing. Just because something is made in a factory, rather than your kitchen, doesn't make it UPF.

A lot of M&S stuff is UPF free and some of the branded products are the worst (Philadelphia anyone?) We don't have time go make absolutely everything from scratch, so just buy the best we can.

We eat fruit, fresh bread or pains aux chocolat or homemade crêpes for breakfast with water, milk or homemade OJ. Probably the easiest meal ( although the DC would devour Nutella if we were to buy it.)

For dinner and lunch at the weekends we tend to have:

• a roast chicken with vegetables
• salmon, white fish, chicken breast or legs, cooked with any combination of onion, garlic, lemon, herbs and spices for flavour, eaten with rice or potatoes and vegetables
• pizza - we buy bases but make the sauce
• soup
• mushroom or cheese or plain omelette
• vegetable, minced beef, or tuna lasagne (with store bought lasagne)
• ratatouille
• homemade burgers
• chicken fajitas, still buying UPF wraps
• quiche
• gratin (any vegetables)
• poached eggs
• side salads of tomatoes, or green leaves, or grated carrot
• sometimes prawns

We make our own cakes, biscuits, desserts and also eat fruit and cheese after meals plus crudités with/before meals.

I want to learn how to make decent wraps and remember / bother to start making pizza bases again (and work out how to get them really thin and crispy.)

What is the best option for pasta if trying to reduce UPFs?

I batch cook and freeze, or eat two days running. Especially bolognase, lasagne meat, chicken stock, chilli and curry.

I rarely make things that are a huge faff. So lasagne, gnocchi, moussaka, quiche, meat pies aren't a frequent occurrence. I have changed what I eat for dinner these days based on the faff factor.

Things I now often make, which I didn't used to, are spaghetti carbonara and other pasta dishes, stir fries, poached salmon. I have a quick pizza recipe which is pretty fast (it's a no yeast version from recipetineats).

I have a bread maker which runs overnight. Takes 5 mins of effort so I don't find bread is a problem.

I do have a few quick dessert recipes. Eg banana nice-cream, chocolate pots, and a microwave sponge with jam. But we are a small family so a cake or something lasts days.

I have switched brands so things like bread sticks, curry paste, fish fingers, ice-cream and baked beans still come from the supermarket but they are no longer upf. Chocolate is Montezuma couverture buttons (bought online) and not upf.

I mix yoghurt with jam or lemon curd if I want flavour. It's nice.

But some things I just accept the upf. I get the highest quality in the supermarket, but still upf. Eg sausages. Swedish meatballs. Yum. No-ones perfect.

Following this for ideas.

I try hard to minimise upf but it is so hard!

As others have said I try to buy minimally processed rather than do everything from scratch - I have a bread maker and I bake our sweet treats (or DC do). Some PP have mentioned non upf brands - I use Ocado and the ingredients lists are really good.

I batch cook meals on my days off work - it gets tedious though and sometimes I just give up and shove fish fingers and oven chips in...

I think it is nigh on impossible in this day and age to completely avoid them though.

I found if I heat lard in the oven as it's warming up, and chop a potato in to chip shapes, then toss in the hot lard, they cook in 20mins which is pretty much the same as oven chips. Much easier than I expected.

Dried pasta isn't upf?

This is a great pizza base which goes thin
https://www.recipetineats.com/no-yeast-pizza-dough/

I have found out good bill has gone up massively since trying to eliminate upf. It feels kind of unrealistic to maintain.

for those trying to find non upf stock. I have found that M&S have jars of stock concerntrate that you keep in the fridge and add water too. Last about 3 weeks I think which is fairly practical and less upf than stock cubes

I tried this, then dd came back from tescos with cheapo white bread and Doritos 🙈

Thank you for the recipe and for the info. about dried pasta.

I often opt for pitta in the shops as it's fewer (fewer weird) ingredients.

Is there a non UPF or less bad option for tortilla wraps?

Crosta mollica wraps are no. Upf. Very expensive though

I buy plenty of stuff that's still pre-packed or prepared but I just read the ingredients first. Something full of emulsifiers, gum, stabilisers, weird shit I can't pronounce, I put it down. Something that has some seed oil in and recognisable ingredients that I would use, fine with me.

I haven't found it that hard I must say as there are often pretty good alternatives that are either aren't UPF or as a near as damn it, and I'm happy with that.

We cook from scratch a lot anyway which is kind of where it is much easier to avoid UPF generally.