Did anyone watch "What are we feeding our kids?" on BBC1

[MarchXX]

Here's link.

i astounded that there has been little to no research of the effect of UPSs on our brains and bodies. The results on Chris (after one month) were dire indeed.

Chris's brain scans before and after were shocking but not surprising as UPF food manufacturers spend multi££££millions on research to find the perfect bliss point to skewer and keep new addicted consumers eating their products again and again.

I was interested in the huge increase in our consumption of UPF foods since 1980 but would have liked to see the difference from 1970 or 1960 because when I was a child growing up (in 60s) there was virtually no UPF foods in our home, all meals were cooked using fresh meat/fish, eggs, veg and fruit with some dried/tinned goods and no ready meals/takeaways. Eating out (or takeaways) was a very rare treat indeed and snacking between meals was frowned upon and not encouraged.

The representative from the food industry was, not surprisingly, reticent about their role in the deteriorating health of our nation's population. Nestle's success in infiltrating remote communities with their UPF-packed supermarket-boats and creating new addicted consumers (and an obesity epidemic) was an eye-opener but not at all surprising seeing as their role in exploiting breastfeeding mothers in third world countries is well known, too.

Anyway, did anyone watch it. What did you think?

I didn’t even see that it was on but I’m very interested in this. I’ll have a watch tonight hopefully.

I generally cook decent evening meals for my kids, always plenty of veg, but we rely on pasta too much and at least once a week it’s shop bought chicken goujons or pies or something.

As for their lunch, they buy it at school, I think it’s probably rubbish. Plus they seem to acquire other snacks along the way. They are teens so I can’t monitor it enough.

I watched it - was one of those programs where you think you know what they are going to say, but it shocks

Sorry - posted too soon! It shocks you into doing something about it. A a mum of teens with relatively good diets, it still made me want to change a whole load of things in their diet

There is a country, maybe Brazil, where they are trying to educate about ultra processed food - they all have a black dot on the packaging, similar to our traffic light system.

Sorry but what is APS? I was great for the first maybe 6 years but definitely have slipped a little though 6 out of 7 dinners are decent. Could do better with school lunches and we've gone from porridge to shreddies over time.

I'm watching tonight. I'm expecting to feel like JumpLeads, that it won't come as a huge shock but will definitely motivate me to change a few things.
We are pretty healthy and most food is homemade but lockdown, work stress and other factors have meant that easy meals like nuggets and chips have crept in for Fridays when I'm too knackered to think clearly. Even the tortilla wraps that DS loves for lunch have an ingredients list that looks like it belongs in a lab.
I think it will be spurring me on to making as much of our food homemade as possible from now on.

Single mum in lockdown working full time. No longer needed a nanny for a year. So instead have somebody come in for a couple of hours 3 days a week to cook home cooked meals as I don’t have time. Watching this show last night I realised it was one of the best financial decisions I could make for my and my teenagers health. It is scary.

I watched. My tween has an awful diet and I got her to watch it to see if the penny drops.

@HeyGirlHeyBoy

Sorry but what is APS? I was great for the first maybe 6 years but definitely have slipped a little though 6 out of 7 dinners are decent. Could do better with school lunches and we've gone from porridge to shreddies over time.

Ultra Processed Food (UPF). It is a relatively recent (last 40 years) food category which hs been scientifically created solely to be overeaten and is very profitable to the food manufacturing industry.

It is "convenient", has a long shelf-life, and contains a lot of chemicals and ingredients that act on the brain to make it irresistible in taste and mouth-feel so you can't stop eating it or want more again soon after.

Nutrition is entirely irrelevant but it can sometimes have added 'vitamins' to seem "healthy" so you don't feel guilty eating it.

Contains ingredients you don't use in your kitchen (and often can't pronounce ).

Oh god... How depressing and yet explains so much. Thank you . Yes wrt wraps... I feel this too. Very interesting. Will see if can watch back.

I think if you had asked me yesterday, I would have said that we had a good diet. We get a local veg box, local grass fed meat and milk, our own chickens for eggs, the only ready meal we have are fish fingers and chips and the occasional pizza. However, the cupboard is full of cereal bars, brioches, wraps, crumpets, biscuits and we do buy kids yogurts, cheese strings, processed meats. So snacks have to change and I really hope this gives me the push to do it because it was really shocking watching it.
I suspect we are a tipping point where the burden on the NHS is more than the income from tax from these foods so hopefully, although it's not the right reason, it is a reason for the government to do something. But it is going to take a lot of re-education about what a healthy diet is and how to cook.

*Blessex•, that sounds bloody amazing! how much did that cost, would you mind me asking? Are they your employee (like a nanny would be) or is it a company?

Cheese strings are just cheese?

I guess it’s good to be suspicious about food that last oddly long, eg wraps. I might have a rethink about them.

I set an alarm on my phone to watch this but forgot.

I have read about UPF before and knew Brazil and France have both done studies on it that showed how awful it is for us. I really want to overhaul my families diet - but we both work FT.

I recently started making granola bars instead of buying them, and we could have jacket potatoes/omelette ect instead of shit food when thinking about dinner after work is too much effort. I do feel that we've been completely conned into the normal lifestyle of working FT and having to rely on convenience food thats bad for us due to time and energy levels.

Yes, I did. I've been avoiding processed foods since the start of the year, which has led to weight loss (2 st so far) and a vast improvement in my stomach health (I have been able to ditch the proton pump inhibitors I was on for acid reflux).

I wanted my husband to see it, as he tends to roll his eyes when I look at a label and say 'It's got modified maize starch in it' etc.

I didn't grow up on processed foods (born 1970s) but I fell into the trap of relying on them when I started working.

I feel much better now I've ditched the processed foods, and I'm surprised to find I enjoy cooking all my meals from scratch now I'm in a routine. The numbers quoted re. children's diets nowadays were very worrying. I agree that action is needed in the UK, such as that taken by the French and Brazilian government.

Yes, I did watch it w my teen DS too!
As another poster replied, I would’ve said our diet in general is pretty decent, but like everyone else, I buy some UP foods. I think if it doesn’t make up the proportion of your diet, then you’re prob ok (if you’re a healthy weight). However I think I’m going to stop buying certain snacks w the chemical ingredients.
Things like Quorn or vegetarian alternatives to meat weren’t mentioned, but they are highly processed too. Also plain crisps are just potatoes and salt? Oven chips, just potato and oil? I even looked at my fish finger box and all the ingredients were ‘normal’...
The worst was the Nestle boat - that was really a shocker.

Yes we watched it. I thought we had a healthy diet, but need to rethink a few things for sure.

We do buy cereal bars for lunchboxes. I thought yogurt was healthy but that’s classed as UPF. We do buy organic yeo valley, but yes it’s all processed.

Occasionally have vegetarian sausages. Not good.

We grow all our own veg and fruit when the weather lets us. We eat a fairly basic, healthy diet. No frozen pizzas or McDonald’s.

It was terrifying that although Dr Chris lost the weight, his brain scan didn’t return to normal.

As for Nestle...well. No words.

Also plain crisps are just potatoes and salt?

It possibly depends what brand you buy - also the oils used can be highly processed, e.g. sunflower oil, rapeseed oil. The programme glossed over fats categorised as 'ingredients' but if you want to minimise processing in your diet, it's better to use olive oil, butter, lard etc.

I've ditched all processed food, sugar and veg oil and wheat for the last 7 weeks. I'm shocked at how much better I feel and have lost 9lbs despite cooking with butter, mainlining cheese and potatoes.

The programme was scary, our health is being controlled by the food industry. There is very little fresh food available if you want to buy something to eat out and about. Probably 90% of the food aisle is made up of stuff I won't eat. I compare local supermarkets with supermarkets abroad even in tourist resorts and its crap. Tiny fish counter if you are lucky, veg aisle contains only very basic veg and salad, meat aisle full of burgers and sausages.

It's frightening what our children perceive as normal.

I haven't seen it, but am currently trying to reduce the amount of UPF we eat. Yy to wraps being bad. I made a batch of homemade ones the other day. Pretty easy and actually tasted of real food!

I ditched UPFs five years ago and the effect on my mental health was profound (which I did not expect). Taking away sugar (in particular) showed me how toxic it was for me. Having stable mental health has been a godsend, not to mention that I don't need to overeat any more and managed to lose a significant amount of excess weight which I have maintained (a blooming miracle).

Yes, it means I have to buy fresh food a couple of times a week and cook a lot more using single ingredients and also make my own cheese and sausages. Still, worth it for the health benefits.

Incidentally, my dental health is awesome now (another side effect of no sugar/grains) and I thoroughly enjoy not getting fillings etc when I go for dental check-ups .

I was talking to DH afterwards and said that in many ways our diet is better now than in the 70’s.

For breakfast in the 70’s/80’s I’d have orange squash with Rice Krispies covered in castor sugar. Now we have porridge made with milk and oats. Certainly less sugar than I had routinely as a child.

Cheese strings are just cheese?

Ingredients include Acidity Regulators (Citric Acid, Lactic Acid) so they're not just cheese.

Cheese strings must have been highly processed to make them behave in that weird bendy way. They behave more like plastic than cheese.

@Arbadacarba

Also plain crisps are just potatoes and salt?

It possibly depends what brand you buy - also the oils used can be highly processed, e.g. sunflower oil, rapeseed oil. The programme glossed over fats categorised as 'ingredients' but if you want to minimise processing in your diet, it's better to use olive oil, butter, lard etc.

That is a very good point @Arbadacarba. It was not mentioned in the programme but ultra processed seed/veg oils are also very, very bad for human health.

Better to cook with unrefined animal fats or fruit oils (avocado, coconut or olive).