6 ms·

one has added sugar and the other not, it’s clear which one is ultra processed

standardUser 2y ago
That doesn't make any sense. If I have a bowl of oatmeal, and I sprinkle sugar on top, it does not magically become ultra-processed.
- digging 2y ago
  Well if the sugar is ultra-processed, yes it does, doesn't it?
  - mecsred 2y ago
    Is the sugar ultra processed?
  - standardUser 2y ago
    No, it does not, since ultra-processed, though not a strictly defined term, does not include household ingredients like granulated sugar or brown sugar. If you happen to have a jar of HFCS in your cabinet then that would quality.
    - roywiggins 2y ago
      it's pretty processed compared to sugarcane at least
      - tourmalinetaco 2y ago
        So homemade bread is ultraprocessed because the wheat was processed into flour?
        d1sxeyes 2y ago
        From what I understand, technically yes. I think there’s a lot of work to be done on categorisation but the underlying principle tends to be fairly decent: the more stuff you do to your raw ingredients, the less healthy they become.
        marcus0x62 2y ago
        No, homemade bread would be NOVA group. 3. The flour itself is group 2 (processed culinary ingredients.) Mixing the group 2 ingredient (flour) with group 1 ingredients (water, yeast, salt) and baking it makes it group 3 (processed food.) If you added something like Xanthan Gum to your "homemade bread", that would make it group 4 (ultra processed foods.)
        d1sxeyes 2y ago
        Thanks for the correction! Homemade bread is a processed food, not an ultra processed food.
        johnyzee 2y ago
        You can process wheat into flour at home. You cannot process sugar cane into table sugar without an industrial plant.
        nobody9999 2y ago
        >You can process wheat into flour at home. You cannot process sugar cane into table sugar without an industrial plant. That statement seemed off, so I poked around a little and, yes you can make granulated sugar from sugar cane at home[0]. [0] https://shuncy.com/article/how-to-make-sugar-from-sugarcane-at-home https://shuncy.com/article/how-to-make-sugar-from-sugarcane-...
        Suppafly 2y ago
        >You cannot process sugar cane into table sugar without an industrial plant. That's obviously false.
    - epcoa 2y ago
      Well then it is a worthless term. Both granulated sugar and HFCS are processed foods. Corn syrup is a household ingredient. No idea why you think a bit higher percentage of fructose changes anything.
      - neomantra 2y ago
        Corn syrup and high-fructose corn syrup are two different ingredients, although they share some words. One is 100% glucose and the other also contains fructose (usually 42% or 55% fructose), produced by chemically altering the corn syrup. We process glucose and sucrose differently and it affects taste, satiation, digestion, and more. I agree that the terminology is useless, by institutional intention.
        epcoa 2y ago
        > chemically altering the corn syrup. And where does corn syrup come from? From squeezing corn? The sugars in corn don’t start as glucose either (they’re starches). Besides, at home, bakers easily make “HFCS” themselves by adding any weak acid to table sugar to make invert sugar (an HFCS 50 equivalent). > We process glucose and sucrose differently Tell that to some southerners about their sweet tea. This simple distinction isn’t that metabolically interesting for day to day life (or explaining the prevalence of obesity and metabolic syndromes). Concentrations in a serving and mode of delivery are far more important. You can pretty easily get metabolic syndrome from excess glucose as well as sucrose. Altering smell and moisture content are more impactful variables. Sucrose readily hydrolyzes to glucose and fructose via sucrase in the small intestine, it and HFCS become equals (no, Mexican coke isn’t healthier you dumb hipsters, just eat a piece of fruit already). If it wasn’t you’d get massive diarrhea from eating it. So sucrose vs HFCS isn’t nearly as distinct. > and it affects taste, satiation, digestion, and more. The most important distinctions go beyond the relative concentrations of the simple sugars. A fresh fruit doesn’t have the same insulin spiking and metabolic syndrome inducing potential as plain Karo syrup or a (Mexican) Coke, even though its relative percentage of fructose is higher or similar.
- YeGoblynQueenne 2y ago
  It does make sense if we're talking about yogurt. The sugary yogurts sold at super markets etc don't have sugar sprinkled on top, but mixed in. Normally, you can't do that. If you make yogurt the standard way [1] and try to add sugar to it while it's still a fluid, it will all sink to the bottom and then you'll just have some yogurt with a layer of sugar on the bottom. If you add it when it's not a fluid anymore, then you'll have a layer at the top. If you try to mix it up in between you'll break it up [2] and end up with mush; with sugar mixed in. The only way I can think of to add sugar to yogurt and ensure it is evenly mixed throughout its mass is to use some additive, probably some kind of stabiliser. I suspect that's what makes this kind of yogurt qualify for the ultra-processed category. Check the ingredients on your favourite yogurt. They should say: milk, yogurt culture. End of transmission. If there's anything else in it, then I would say there's a good claim it's been over-processed. ____________ [1] Bring milk to boil or use UHT. Let cool to 45° C (113° F). Add lactic ferments (Lactobacillus delbrueckii subsp. bulgaricus and Streptococcus thermophilus - readiest source: yogurt). Keep warm. Do not disturb. Wait. Enjoy. Scales up to industrial level (and is dirt cheap to boot). [2] That's called syneresis - that's when you put a spoon in and then find a little puddle of milky fluid in its wake a few hours later. You've broken apart the jell'0 like structure of the yogurt's curd, i.e. the coagulated milk solids, and caused the milk fluids to leak out.
  - standardUser 2y ago
    There are many brands of yogurt with "fruit on the bottom" or otherwise unmixed that use plain sugar. Not every store-bought product is the worst possible version of a store-bought product. There's a huge variation.
    - YeGoblynQueenne 2y ago
      >> Not every store-bought product is the worst possible version of a store-bought product. I agree with that for the general case but my intuition is that if someone's selling you something ready-made and pre-packaged, that you can easily make yourself (yogurt with fruit mixed in), then that's because they want to charge you extra and force you into a choice -of ingredients- you possibly wouldn't make. For example, the yogurts with fruit I've had in the UK were just not very good yogurts, and the fruit were just not very good fruit. The yogurts were the thin and tasteless stuff that seems to be typical of anywhere outside the Balkans (I'm Greek) and the fruit were basically preserve, with added sugar. Why do you need added sugar with fruit? Because the fruit is under-ripe and probably too sour to eat in the first place. You have to think of the economics a bit. Yogurt is cheap to make and most people won't pay a premium for it. Also it's sour and many people (again, outside the Balkans) don't like that. So companies will add sweeteners and sweet admixtures, like jam, honey or fruit to make it more palatable. And of course to make that financially viable they have to drop the quality of the ingredients. And that's where the additives come in: they improve packaging, transport and distribution, even as they degrade taste and nutrition.
- leptons 2y ago
  Oats also don't grow as individual flakes, they are processed too. Separating and concentrating a single ingredient is "processing" it. If you want the healthiest oats, you probably need to grow them yourself and eat them directly off the stalk. I'm joking, of course - sort of.
  - navaed01 2y ago
    There is a difference between processing an oat and the derivative ‘ingredients’ that are used to simulate the mouth feel of ‘ice cream’ - which includes a type of mold. I agree the distinction is murky and can be easy to mock but at the end of the day something associated with these foods is making societies deeply sick and that should encourage us all to care about a solution. Even if you take a libertarian approach to diet, the economic cost of caring for a society with rampant obesity and diabetes impacts us all

That doesn't make any sense. If I have a bowl of oatmeal, and I sprinkle sugar on top, it does not magically become ultra-processed.

digging 2y ago
Well if the sugar is ultra-processed, yes it does, doesn't it?
- mecsred 2y ago
  Is the sugar ultra processed?
- standardUser 2y ago
  No, it does not, since ultra-processed, though not a strictly defined term, does not include household ingredients like granulated sugar or brown sugar. If you happen to have a jar of HFCS in your cabinet then that would quality.
  - roywiggins 2y ago
    it's pretty processed compared to sugarcane at least
    - tourmalinetaco 2y ago
      So homemade bread is ultraprocessed because the wheat was processed into flour?
      - d1sxeyes 2y ago
        From what I understand, technically yes. I think there’s a lot of work to be done on categorisation but the underlying principle tends to be fairly decent: the more stuff you do to your raw ingredients, the less healthy they become.
        marcus0x62 2y ago
        No, homemade bread would be NOVA group. 3. The flour itself is group 2 (processed culinary ingredients.) Mixing the group 2 ingredient (flour) with group 1 ingredients (water, yeast, salt) and baking it makes it group 3 (processed food.) If you added something like Xanthan Gum to your "homemade bread", that would make it group 4 (ultra processed foods.)
        d1sxeyes 2y ago
        Thanks for the correction! Homemade bread is a processed food, not an ultra processed food.
      - johnyzee 2y ago
        You can process wheat into flour at home. You cannot process sugar cane into table sugar without an industrial plant.
        nobody9999 2y ago
        >You can process wheat into flour at home. You cannot process sugar cane into table sugar without an industrial plant. That statement seemed off, so I poked around a little and, yes you can make granulated sugar from sugar cane at home[0]. [0] https://shuncy.com/article/how-to-make-sugar-from-sugarcane-at-home https://shuncy.com/article/how-to-make-sugar-from-sugarcane-...
        Suppafly 2y ago
        >You cannot process sugar cane into table sugar without an industrial plant. That's obviously false.
  - epcoa 2y ago
    Well then it is a worthless term. Both granulated sugar and HFCS are processed foods. Corn syrup is a household ingredient. No idea why you think a bit higher percentage of fructose changes anything.
    - neomantra 2y ago
      Corn syrup and high-fructose corn syrup are two different ingredients, although they share some words. One is 100% glucose and the other also contains fructose (usually 42% or 55% fructose), produced by chemically altering the corn syrup. We process glucose and sucrose differently and it affects taste, satiation, digestion, and more. I agree that the terminology is useless, by institutional intention.
      - epcoa 2y ago
        > chemically altering the corn syrup. And where does corn syrup come from? From squeezing corn? The sugars in corn don’t start as glucose either (they’re starches). Besides, at home, bakers easily make “HFCS” themselves by adding any weak acid to table sugar to make invert sugar (an HFCS 50 equivalent). > We process glucose and sucrose differently Tell that to some southerners about their sweet tea. This simple distinction isn’t that metabolically interesting for day to day life (or explaining the prevalence of obesity and metabolic syndromes). Concentrations in a serving and mode of delivery are far more important. You can pretty easily get metabolic syndrome from excess glucose as well as sucrose. Altering smell and moisture content are more impactful variables. Sucrose readily hydrolyzes to glucose and fructose via sucrase in the small intestine, it and HFCS become equals (no, Mexican coke isn’t healthier you dumb hipsters, just eat a piece of fruit already). If it wasn’t you’d get massive diarrhea from eating it. So sucrose vs HFCS isn’t nearly as distinct. > and it affects taste, satiation, digestion, and more. The most important distinctions go beyond the relative concentrations of the simple sugars. A fresh fruit doesn’t have the same insulin spiking and metabolic syndrome inducing potential as plain Karo syrup or a (Mexican) Coke, even though its relative percentage of fructose is higher or similar.
YeGoblynQueenne 2y ago
It does make sense if we're talking about yogurt. The sugary yogurts sold at super markets etc don't have sugar sprinkled on top, but mixed in. Normally, you can't do that. If you make yogurt the standard way [1] and try to add sugar to it while it's still a fluid, it will all sink to the bottom and then you'll just have some yogurt with a layer of sugar on the bottom. If you add it when it's not a fluid anymore, then you'll have a layer at the top. If you try to mix it up in between you'll break it up [2] and end up with mush; with sugar mixed in. The only way I can think of to add sugar to yogurt and ensure it is evenly mixed throughout its mass is to use some additive, probably some kind of stabiliser. I suspect that's what makes this kind of yogurt qualify for the ultra-processed category. Check the ingredients on your favourite yogurt. They should say: milk, yogurt culture. End of transmission. If there's anything else in it, then I would say there's a good claim it's been over-processed. ____________ [1] Bring milk to boil or use UHT. Let cool to 45° C (113° F). Add lactic ferments (Lactobacillus delbrueckii subsp. bulgaricus and Streptococcus thermophilus - readiest source: yogurt). Keep warm. Do not disturb. Wait. Enjoy. Scales up to industrial level (and is dirt cheap to boot). [2] That's called syneresis - that's when you put a spoon in and then find a little puddle of milky fluid in its wake a few hours later. You've broken apart the jell'0 like structure of the yogurt's curd, i.e. the coagulated milk solids, and caused the milk fluids to leak out.
- standardUser 2y ago
  There are many brands of yogurt with "fruit on the bottom" or otherwise unmixed that use plain sugar. Not every store-bought product is the worst possible version of a store-bought product. There's a huge variation.
  - YeGoblynQueenne 2y ago
    >> Not every store-bought product is the worst possible version of a store-bought product. I agree with that for the general case but my intuition is that if someone's selling you something ready-made and pre-packaged, that you can easily make yourself (yogurt with fruit mixed in), then that's because they want to charge you extra and force you into a choice -of ingredients- you possibly wouldn't make. For example, the yogurts with fruit I've had in the UK were just not very good yogurts, and the fruit were just not very good fruit. The yogurts were the thin and tasteless stuff that seems to be typical of anywhere outside the Balkans (I'm Greek) and the fruit were basically preserve, with added sugar. Why do you need added sugar with fruit? Because the fruit is under-ripe and probably too sour to eat in the first place. You have to think of the economics a bit. Yogurt is cheap to make and most people won't pay a premium for it. Also it's sour and many people (again, outside the Balkans) don't like that. So companies will add sweeteners and sweet admixtures, like jam, honey or fruit to make it more palatable. And of course to make that financially viable they have to drop the quality of the ingredients. And that's where the additives come in: they improve packaging, transport and distribution, even as they degrade taste and nutrition.
leptons 2y ago
Oats also don't grow as individual flakes, they are processed too. Separating and concentrating a single ingredient is "processing" it. If you want the healthiest oats, you probably need to grow them yourself and eat them directly off the stalk. I'm joking, of course - sort of.
- navaed01 2y ago
  There is a difference between processing an oat and the derivative ‘ingredients’ that are used to simulate the mouth feel of ‘ice cream’ - which includes a type of mold. I agree the distinction is murky and can be easy to mock but at the end of the day something associated with these foods is making societies deeply sick and that should encourage us all to care about a solution. Even if you take a libertarian approach to diet, the economic cost of caring for a society with rampant obesity and diabetes impacts us all