What a great way of thinking about it.
this post was submitted on 30 Apr 2025
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Reverse the perspective - organic food is something YOU were designed to eat.
Like peanuts!
Like apple seeds
Jokes aside, there's evidence that the more processed the food in your daily consumtion is, the more likely you're to get fat and other health issues. Our natural mechanisms to detect if you've had enough don't work as well on processed food.
Just in case someone takes this seriously.
You have a study link? I'm interested in how they show causation. Because health conscious people will be more likely to eat healthier, and less likely to eat highly processed foods.
The harsh reality of ultra processed food - with Chris Van Tulleken
not a study but an informative RI lecture
While its almost certain that whole food diets are optimal, theres nothing inherent about food being processed that makes it unhealthy. Some people take anything to do with diet/fitness/wellness to stupid places like "Ugh! That protein bar is PROCESSED! These brownies are home made from whole ingredients, I dont polute my body." Whey protein powder is processed, multi vitamins are processed and greens powders are processed... Raw milk isnt processed... my lactose free dairy products are processed and thats best for everyone.
It's not literally any processing that's the problem. It's that what we generally call processed food is engineered to optimize for things other than the health of those who eat it: flavor, addictiveness, cheapness, etc. And all of those goals are so pervasive and so at odds with health that virtually anything we call "processed food" is terrible for us.
Processed unhealthy foods are generally viewed as the items that have been stripped down in to some degree and then reassembled with ingredients like sugar, preservatives, flavors, dyes, stabilizers, etc.
Many studies have shown that yes, indeed, there are processed foods that are inherently unhealthy. We don’t need to play with semantics of what “processed” means to split hairs in an effort to be right.
First thing I said was that whole foods are optimal, thats the key takeaway here. Yeah, some processed foods are TERRIBLE for you, some processed foods are "not bad" for you, some are even healthy. My point is that a food being processed isnt the defining element on wether or not its bad for you. In most cases its the ease of access combined with the hyper paletable nature of processed foods that will do you in.
Isn't "Processed" a really open term? Like, if I bake some veggies in my oven they're technically processed?
It's why there is also the category of ultra processed. That's where they start to add fat, sugar, salt, dye and preservatives. That's where things get unhealthy.
Exactly. Take my preferred snack for example, a bag of oven baked pork rinds. 37G protein, 12g fat, 0 carbs. (Ok theres an assload of salt) about 250 cals. No artificial colors, flavours or preservatives... is that "processed"?
My point was more along the lines that a "processed" formed chicken breast pattie isnt somehow worse for you than a big slab of crunchy fatty pork belly because it went through a machine. Its possible to make good decisions involving processed food and terrible whole foods decisions too... delicious decadent "now I want pork belly" decisions. I do wonder how many of these studies control for calorie intake, quality of nutrition, etc.
In my honest opinion, processed things are things that are, through scientific methods, made to be addictive. Like Pringles having the perfect crunch or different chemical compounds of Red Bull (color spot on the bottom). I don’t count cured meat as processed, but I have a hard time calling a pound of deli ham anything but processed.
See you just gave me the perfect example. Pringles.
Compare the macros on a serve of Pringles (definitely an ultra-processed food. I googled the ingredients - Dehydrated potato, vegetable oils, wheat starch (gluten), rice flour, emulsifier (471), maltodextrin, salt, acidity regulator (330).) and a serve of Kettle Chips (Potatoes, sunflower oil, sea salt) the macros are pretty damn close to the same. One is ultra-processed, one is at least processed and I imagine if you thinly sliced a potato and fried it at home and salted them you would get a similar product with similar nutrition to the Kettle chips but would it still be considered processed?
Admittedly there is an argument to be made about micronutrients and phytochemicals that would give the kettles and home mades a slight edge on any "which is healthier" discussion, but the honest answer to "Which of these foods should you sit down and demolish a salad bowl full of?" is NONE because processed or not, its a highly paletable bowl of calorie dense food thats incredibly easy to over consume.
The problem isnt the processing, the problem is that making a giant pile of home made chips is hard and time consuming so you probably wont and a bag of Kettles is a $3 addition to my trolley.
The problem isnt the processing, the problem is that making a giant pile of home made chips is hard and time consuming so you probably wont
This is it exactly! Look at noodles! I consider them processed food, and since I got a noodle machine (non-electric) I don’t eat them as often as I used to.
Even if you got the flour at home, it’s still very time consuming. you would think twice if you just throw some potatoes into boiling water or if you risk making your kitchen dirty while hand-making noodles.
If you wash the dirt of the veggies they are technically processed
above all else, processed foods are designed to maximize profits.
processed foods
Cool: define it objectively.
If it's cleaned, peeled, or cooked, is it processed?
Sorting is a process. If they took out any of the bad ones before shipping it, it's been processed.
They're talking about ultra/highly processed foods, which is what most people mean when they mention it.
ultra/highly processed foods
Cool: define that objectively.
Cheese, fermented food, or baked goods: ultraprocessed?
I look at the food I (could) make at home or get in a restaurant and wonder what these words mean.
Ultra processed it when it's broken down and reassembled, often adding nutrients, preservatives and other additives.
Oat milk is a good example.
Cheese blocks and bottled wine are not ultra processed but American "cheese" is definitely ultra processed.
This is not the gotcha, no one really knows, shrug that people pretend it is. There is no gray area.
Given two similar products such as cheese, one can be ultra processed while the other is not. There is no cheese that is sort of maybe kind of ultra processed. There is a clear line that is crossed.
Pretending otherwise it only yo the benefit of the food industry who prefers we pretend it's a fuzzy concept because it would affect their profits.
Pretending otherwise
Seems the pretense is clarity: even researchers criticize it.
How is cheese not ultraprocessed? It's acid & rennet or bacteria transforming milk significantly.
The Harvard article someone else linked to define ultraprocessed lists examples hotdogs, cold cuts, cakes.
Anyone can bake a cake from scratch. Anyone with a meat grinder can make sausages & mortadella traditionally. Without industry or a meat grinder, anyone can make hams or cured meats.
Is the hot sauce I make by passing peppers & garlic through a blender, then adding some salt, oil, vinegar processed?
Industry isn't necessary, only kitchen ability. You're making this about industry when the concept on examination is suspect.
That's 1 presentation. Is there much uniform agreement on it? Is the classification objectively precise & reliable?
Their School of Public Health acknowledges problems with definition & attempted standards
the definition of processed food varies widely depending on the source
The NOVA system is recognized by the World Health Organization, Food and Agriculture Organization, and the Pan American Health Organization, but not currently in the U.S. by the Food and Drug Administration or USDA. NOVA has been criticized for being too general in classifying certain foods, causing confusion.
Other scholarly review articles criticize the classification as unclear even among researchers.
Processed food classification: Conceptualisation and challenges regarding classifications:
There is no consensus on what determines the level of food processing.
Classification systems that categorise foods according to their “level of processing” have been used to predict diet quality and health outcomes and inform dietary guidelines and product development. However, the classification criteria used are ambiguous, inconsistent and often give less weight to existing scientific evidence on nutrition and food processing effects; critical analysis of these criteria creates conflict amongst researchers.
The classification systems embody socio-cultural elements and subjective terms, including home cooking and naturalness. Hence, “processing” is a chaotic conception, not only concerned with technical processes.
The concept of “whole food” and the role of the food matrix in relation to healthy diets needs further clarification; the risk assessment/management of food additives also needs debate.
Processed food classification: Conceptualisation and challenges regarding a single classification system (NOVA):
The present paper explores the definition of ultra-processed foods since its inception and clearly shows that the definition of such foods has varied considerably.
Thus, there is little consistency either in the definition of ultra-processed foods or in examples of foods within this category.
The public health nutrition advice of NOVA is that ultra-processed foods should be avoided to achieve improvements in nutrient intakes with an emphasis on fat, sugar, and salt. The present manuscript demonstrates that the published data for the United States, United Kingdom, France, Brazil, and Canada all show that across quintiles of intake of ultra-processed foods, nutritionally meaningful changes are seen for sugars and fiber but not for total fat, saturated fat, and sodium. Moreover, 2 national surveys in the United Kingdom and France fail to show any link between body mass index and consumption of ultra-processed foods.
Some research articles find the leading definition unreliable: low consistency between nutrition specialists following the same definition.
Although assignments were more consistent for some foods than others, overall consistency among evaluators was low, even when ingredient information was available. These results suggest current NOVA criteria do not allow for robust and functional food assignments.
If experts aren't able to classify "ultraprocessed" items consistently, then what chance has anyone? At the moment, "processed food" seems more buzz & connotation than substance.
It might make more sense to classify food by something clearer like nutritional content.
At the moment, “processed food” seems more buzz & connotation than substance
Yes, we both agree on this. Organic, natural, etc. are all, scientifically, ill defined, advertising labels. However, in this particular discussion, people are pointing towards the way it is used in common lexicon, rather than a scientific, or technical one. When your average person says these things, they mean things that have gone through more processing than what was traditionally done, before the point of making a meal from it, or the after processing it goes through to make a meal have as long a shelf life as possible, etc. These processes include things like introducing additives to make the color better, the introduction of extracts, synthesized chemicals, etc., to enhance flavor, improve presentation, extend shelf life, etc. That are not traditional things like salting, smoking, drying, freezing/cooling, etc. That page from Harvard isn't trying to be an authoritative statement on exactly what "ultra-processed" means to an industry, rather than to be a common framework, for the most general level of understanding, of the contemporary processes that food is put through, that are beyond traditional methodology.
I think the word organic gets over used a lot, like "try our organic strawberries", I've never heard of chemical strawberries so what's the deal?
As I understand, it's a legal food term in the US. Can't write it onto your food there, unless you fulfill certain requirements in how it's produced.
Afaik, organic is related to how things are grown and processed. For example, you shouldn't use the peel from normal lemons as they are treated with fungicide wax that is not exactly healthy. If you buy organic lemons, you can use the peel. But I agree that the term is overused and missunderstood a lot, and blindly trusting that organic foods are healthy does not work
Really? You've never had starburst or skittles?
Even organic is chemical
Mechanical strawberries are also not great for you
I'm more of an inorganic strawberry person
They're much too crunchy imo. They really hurt my mouth and throat.
could it be this referred to the farming method they used?
With all the preservatives, you might live longer☠️
Bro they are just making sure that the zombies don’t rot too fast 🧟♂️ 🧟♀️ 🧟
It's safer to preserve you in the ground.
"washed" as if your body was steril lmao you have more bacteria in your gut than one kidney weighs
Yeah, and we use mold to make cheese. Doesn't mean the one on your wall is fine.
While you're both right, that's not the point they made.
Worse, I cook my food too