Read [this article](https://amp.cnn.com/cnn/2024/07/01/health/worst-ultraprocessed-food-early-death-wellness) and though I’m scientifically literate and understand how scientific research can be overdramatized by the media, I’m worried. How I avoid ultra processed food, it is apparently everything. Ugh
In: Biology
“Ultraprocessed” is kind of like “obscenity”: You can’t really define it, but you know it when you see it. A Twinkie is ultraprocessed. A cut up apple is minimally processed. Exactly how much processing do you need to do to a food before it crosses the line into ultraprocessed? Who can say?
It’s also beside the point, because it’s not really a binary thing. It’s not like you process food up to a point and it’s healthy, but one more step and it’ll kill you. It’s a continuum.
Processing food is really the process of making it easier to eat. Cooking a chicken breast makes it easier to eat than a raw chicken. Ground cooked chicken is even easier to eat. Grinding it really fine, forming it into a nugget, adding a bunch of salt and flavorings and deep frying it makes it super easy to eat — a bit too easy to put down a bunch of calories without even realizing it.
And that’s the issue. It’s the same advice as always: don’t eat too much. Ultraprocessed food just makes “too much” a lot easier to eat.
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