The Poisoning

The food you eat every day is likely poisoning you.

There is a huge issue in most developed countries where the food quality that the average citizen is consuming is in perpetual decline. Restaurant food becomes more and more processed to save costs for the corporations at the expense of the consumer’s health. Fast food is made hyper-palatable, so each person needs more food to be full. Calories are no longer respected as a means of portion control.

Things are bad.

Grocery stores aren’t any better. Food labels include dozens of unrecognizable ingredients for processing and preservation. Most packaged goods are so nutritionally void, that vitamins and minerals need to be added post-processing to put back in the nutrients that were present in the original ingredient. Fruit juice is sugar water with vitamins and minerals added to make it seem more legitimate.

But how could you possibly know all this?

Hiding in Plain Sight

It’s right in front of your face.

You’ve likely eaten a 1000+ calorie meal from a fast-food joint that you didn’t feel full after. You also have been to a restaurant that fills you up with the most delicious breadsticks, pasta and desert. Who knows how much you ate there, but you remember how drained you felt afterwards.

Fortunately, food at the grocery store has to be labeled. For the average consumer that doesn’t mean much though. Just like there are still cigarette smokers even after extreme labels were added to the packaging, showing the true colors of food does little to deter consumption.

The ingredients are labeled. The nutrients (and lack thereof) are labeled. But problem isn’t only that the package labels are misleading, it’s the food itself. Processed foods have infiltrated our diets, and it’s undeniable. The package straight-up tells you.

Processed vs Whole Foods

Processed food is bad for you.

Processed foods often contain multiple ingredients, come packaged with ingredient lists, and lose significant nutritional value during processing.

On the other hand, Whole foods are good for you.

Whole foods are single ingredients with little to no processing, easily recognized as found in nature:

• Fruits

• Vegetables

• Grains

• Legumes

• Meat

• Fish

• Eggs

Some whole foods, such as grains, are minimally processed to make them consumable, however, they still keep their nutritional value.

Most foods you can get from restaurants, fast food, and other high-availability places are not whole foods. While you will see whole options at some food places, the options are usually limited and come in a combo with other processed food. Whole foods are generally much more filling, and expensive, two things that restaurants don’t want. They want you to eat more, and the food they provide to be cheap for them.

Whole Foods for Whole Nutrition

Whole foods are more nutritious because they have not had nutrients removed, or ingredients added, via processing.

Take an example: apples vs applesauce vs apple juice.

An apple, being a whole food, and in its natural form, will have sugars (carbohydrates), fiber, and a large combination of micronutrients. All of these parts make up the whole, and the interaction of all the parts makes the apple a healthy food.

Applesauce is a slightly processed form of an apple. The apples are crushed into a more palatable form. Micronutrients may still be present but will occasionally be added back after a loss from processing. The fiber in the applesauce will also likely be lower, which increases the speed at which the sugar is absorbed into the bloodstream. Finally, sugar may be added, after processing, to make the flavor even richer. Overall, the slight processing retains many of the benefits of the whole apple but loses a lot of the synergy from the parts of the whole, and added ingredients like sugar can completely change the nutritional value of the food altogether.

Last, let’s look at apple juice. This is a highly processed form of an apple. In some cases, the flavor is the only recognizable part of the apple. The apple is juiced to extract the flavor and sugar that makes the apple delicious, while transforming it into a hyper-palatable drink. Fiber is removed altogether and many of the micronutrients that are in an Apple are lost through processing. The “apple” juice has been changed into apple-flavored sugar water. Even more, processing these juices usually adds a substantial amount of sugar to the already nutritionally devoid fluid. This creates a cocktail of hyper-palatable, delicious sugar water that is mostly nutritionally empty carbohydrates.

Food Form Matters

You might be wondering why it matters. If it tastes good, what else is there to concern yourself with?

Our body needs nutrients. Eating a large amount of highly processed, nutritionally void food leads to the following:

1. Overconsumption and fat gain.

2. Reduced mental and physical capacity.

3. Health issues due to fat gain and nutrient deficiency.

4. Low energy.

5. Disease caused by additives and preservatives.

The list goes on.

If you are eating nutritionally void foods for every one of your meals every day, it will catch up to you. Your body is amazingly resilient, but it requires a minimum amount of a vast array of nutrients to function.

You need protein. Protein is present in large amounts in whole foods, but usually reduced significantly in hyper-palatable foods.

You need healthy fats. Healthy fats are present in large amounts in whole foods but are usually replaced with highly processed fats in fast-food.

You need micronutrients. Micronutrient variety is often noticeably lacking from highly processed foods, while whole foods have a large amount.

How to Shop

Now that you know about whole foods vs processed foods, and why whole foods should be consumed over processed foods, you are ready to grocery shop with new knowledge.

The goal when choosing and eating meals is to choose recipes that are a majority whole foods. When processed foods are used in a recipe, ensure that the ingredient is only minimally processed (think about things like butter, rice, quinoa etc.).

Here are a few tips for choosing foods at the grocery store.

1. If the food is not in a package, it is likely a single ingredient and whole food. Fruits and vegetables often do not require a package because they are what they are.

2. If the food is in a package, the back will show the ingredients. Ideally, the ingredient list should include only one ingredient. The fewer the better, and if you don’t know the ingredient on the list, then it is likely something added through processing or preservation.

3. Just because nutritional labels show micronutrients in the food does not make the food healthy. Nutrients are added after processing in many cases, to add nutritional value to an otherwise nutritionally void food.

Fewer Ingredients for Greater Health

In summary:

• The fewer the ingredients in the food you eat, the more likely you are eating whole foods.

• The more whole foods you are eating, the more nutrients you are receiving from the foods.

• The more nutrients you receive from your food, the easier it is to control weight, energy, focus, and most important HEALTH.

• Eating whole foods over time will make you healthy. Eating processed foods over time will make you unhealthy.

Eat to live.