We have a cookie break at our Saturday night Mexican train game. We buy the cookies at the grocery store bakery. They’ve gotta be healthier than the packaged kind on the shelves. Right? But when I broke the paper label to open the plastic container, the list of ingredients wrapped from the front of the box to the back. Thirty-one mostly unpronounceable, polysyllabic and totally unfamiliar ingredients such as thiamin mononitrate and monodiglycerides.
Geez. I made Quaker Oats Vanishing Oatmeal cookies a while back and they had only 10 ingredients – 11 if you count the raisins.
It’s the first time I ever thought about why health agencies warn against eating store-bought baked goods. I really hadn’t paid attention to the ingredients. After all, aren’t all oatmeal cookies about the same?
It makes you wonder, who invented these ingredients and how they determined they would somehow help the cookie to be better. I picture a mad scientist chef with an array of bottles, much like the array of spice bottles home cooks have, only the jars say thiamin mononitrate, monodiglycerides, Sodiumsilico Aluminate, Reduced Iron, Whey Protein, Concentrate/ Potassium Bicarbonate, etc. The mad scientist chef says, “I’ll add a teaspoon of Reduced Iron and a tablespoon of Whey Protein Concentrate/Potassium Bicarbonate.” Or maybe, to make it easy, the mad scientist chef has spice combo jars like the home cook has Cajun Seasoning, Italian Seasoning, and Oatmeal Cookie Additives.
All kidding aside, I think these are all preservatives but it seems like there are more unpronounceable ingredients than the plain food ingredients in bakery oatmeal cookies. Twenty more to be exact. I Googled some of these ingredients and discovered that Whey Protein Concentrate/Potassium Bicarbonate reduces muscle loss during bed rest. (1) That makes me feel better. If I’m ever on bed rest, I’ll eat a lot of bakery oatmeal cookies.
That got me wondering about all the warnings about highly processed foods. There is actually a system for classifying highly processed foods. Carlos Monteiro, Nutrition and Public Health professor at the University of Sao Paulo, Brazil. developed the NOVA (new) system for classifying food because he noticed even though sugar consumption had dropped, diabetes had increased. (2, 3)
The NOVA system has four categories from Category 1 – Unprocessed or minimally processed (no added salt, oils, sugars, etc.) to Category 4– Ultra-processed (industrial formulations made entirely or mostly from substances extracted from foods or synthesized in laboratories. E.g., hydrogenated oils, foods with flavor enhancers). Examples of category 4 are soft drinks, chips, chocolate, candy, ice cream, sweetened breakfast cereals, packaged soups, chicken nuggets, hotdogs, fries, and more.
Chocolate? Wait! I thought chocolate was a healthy food. Cleveland Clinic lists seven benefits of dark chocolate including increased blood flow, high fiber, protection from sun damage, and mood enhancer. (4) There’s no way I’m giving up Ghirardelli’s Intense Dark Sea Salt.
Not only do scientists disagree on the healthfulness of foods listed in each NOVA category (e.g., dark chocolate), but several articles also disagree on the definition of highly processed foods. NOVA considers frozen food a Category 1 and the Google considers it a Category 4.
Even if everyone agreed on the definition of highly processed, given a definition, experts disagree on classifying foods by that definition. In a study of NOVA classification, French food and nutrition specialists (and the French know food) assigned foods to NOVA groups. The overall consistency among evaluators was low. The results of this study suggest that current NOVA criteria do not allow for robust and functional food assignments. (5)
Artificial Intelligence (AI) has a solution to disagreement about food classification. AI has created a tool, FoodProX, that predicts the food processing level based on nutritional information from the Department of Agriculture’s Food and Nutrition database. (6) FoodProX claims more than 73% of US Food is ultra-processed. (see Epilogue for more information).
But aren’t we living longer? The life expectancy in 1960, before much of our food was highly processed, was 66.6 for men and 73.1 for women. Now, it’s 73.8 for men and 79.5 for women. If ultra-reprocessed food is so unhealthy, why are we living longer? I guess you could argue that people my age (over 75) spent most of their life eating real food. But I’ve eaten my fair share of highly-processed foods.
At my age, I have too little time left to spend time worrying about ultra-processed foods. If they were going to shorten my life or make me sick, they would have done so by now. I’ll eat my dark chocolate, slurp my diet coke, bite into my Impossible Beef burger, and buy bakery cookies when I don’t feel like making my own - about 90% of the time. I do avoid high fructose corn syrup and hydrogenated oils. That’s about the limit of my concern.
Right now, I am off to the grocery store. My grocery list includes a lot of food highly-processed foods: Bakery Oatmeal Cookies, Impossible Beef, Ghirardelli’s Sea Salt Soiree, Soy Milk, diet Coke, and Digiorno Rising Crust Pizza. But it also includes spinach, apples, bananas, salad mix, frozen blueberries, and cheddar cheese. They say you need a balanced diet.
June 20 is ice cream soda, milkshake, and smoothie day. My advice: Enjoy your drink and don't pay attention to the ingredients!
Epilogue
I joke about life expectancy and highly processed food but it is true that diseases once associated with older age are becoming more frequent in younger, even school-age, people. John Hopkins reports an increase in type 2 diabetes, high blood pressure, strokes, colorectal cancer, and brain shrinkage in younger people. Eating highly processed foods is a contributor to those issues. But this blog is for seniors.
There are also people with food sensitivities who have to be concerned about food additives.
If you want to compare the degree of processing in the foods you buy, visit TrueFood. It looks like you have to find the food on the website. I couldn’t find an app you can use while you are in the grocery store.
If you are concerned about processed food – here’s a list of food additives to avoid: (7)
Red Dye No. 3: a coloring agent, can cause cancer in animals and cause behavioral problems such as hyperactivity.
Potassium bromate: a leavening agent is possibly carcinogenic.
Titanium dioxide: a whitener, color enhancer, and anti-caking agent found in candies, baked goods, creamy salad dressings, and frozen dairy products like pizza and ice cream can damage DNA and harm the immune system.
Brominated vegetable oil: an emulsifier in fruit drinks and sodas can act as an endocrine disrupter. Because of its risks large soda manufacturers such as Coke and Pepsi have removed it but it’s still in smaller brands.
Propylparaben: a preservative in packaged baked goods particularly pastries and tortillas. It can also be in cosmetics. Acts as an endocrine disrupter,
References
Alessandra Bosutti, Michele Salanova, Dieter Blottner, et al, Whey protein with potassium bicarbonate supplement attenuates the reduction in muscle oxidative capacity during 19 days of bed rest, National Library of Medicine, October 1, 2016
Nicola Morea, Ultra Processed Foods, NOVA classification, Mérieux NutriSciences, March 25, 2021
Carlos Augusto Monteiro, Geoffrey Cannon, Mark Lawrence, et al, Ultra-processed foods, diet quality, and health using the NOVA classification system, Food and Agriculture Organization of the United States, 2019
Dark Chocolate Health Benefits, Cleveland Clinic, March 10, 2022
Braesco, V., Souchon, I., Sauvant, P. et al., Ultra-processed foods: how functional is the NOVA system?, European Journal of Clinical Nutrition, March 21, 2022
Tanner Stening, Ultra-Processed Foods: AI’s New Contribution to Nutrition Science, Neuroscience News, June 2, 2023.
Dana G. Smith, California and New York Could Ban 5 Food Additives, The New York Times, Apr 13, 2023. Food additives, the chemicals manufacturers add to food to act as preservatives and enhance color, texture, and flavor. They want to prohibit the manufacturing and sale of additives that have been linked to cancer, neurodevelopmental issues, and hormone dysfunction. The five additives are commonly found in baked goods, candy, and soda and are totally banned in food products in Europe.
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