I remember helping my grandmother make applesauce in her kitchen. She led the process while I turned the handle on the grinder that removed the pith, seeds, and skin from the apples. Explaining the steps of the process, she spoke about how careful we needed to be to ensure the applesauce was properly canned so that harmful toxins couldn’t grow before all the applesauce was consumed.

This piqued my curiosity. “Why would we spend all this time preparing something that could go bad when we can just go to the store and buy applesauce that can stay on our pantry shelves for years?”

Her reply came without a moment’s hesitation. “Because food that doesn’t go bad doesn’t have what we need to live a healthy life. Going bad is nature’s way of recycling living things. The food that sustains us comes from living things.”

This summer I heard Dr Chris Van Tulleken speaking about his new book, Ultra Processed People. What he said reinforced the wisdom of my grandmother. In his book Van Tulleken explains what Ultra Processed Food (UPF) is, the ingredients it contains that are considered food, and the ones that are considered “food additives” that really are not food. Then he dives into the research on how and why UPF consumption is driving a wave of obesity, disease, and early death in our world.

Many things in Van Tulleken’s book astonished me. For example, studies where they recruited volunteers to test the effect of an ultra-processed versus a minimally processed diet. Both groups’ diets contained identical macronutrients. Participants in both groups reported equal satisfaction with the diets. However, when they measured levels of hormones secreted in the guts of the different study group participants, those eating the non-UPF diet had appetite hormones that peaked BEFORE the participants started eating, whereas UPF diet participants had appetite hormones levels that peaked AFTER the participants started eating, resulting in this group eating an average of 500 calories more than the other group. The conclusion is that something about UPF appears to drive excess consumption. In other words, UPF foods override the signaling to our brain that tells us to stop eating.

Is it the salt, the sugar, the fat that drives excess consumption of UPF? Apparently not. The book meticulously spells out the case that it is the synthetic molecules, which are referred to as “food additives” that drive excess consumption. These molecules are IN UPF foods, but THEY REALLY ARE NOT FOOD AT ALL.

In a Brazilian UPF study they found that participants who had a bag of sugar in their kitchen tended to be healthier. If we believe that sugar is one of the main culprits, this finding makes no sense. But remember, it is the synthetic molecules in UPF that drive excess consumption. Synthetic ingredients like emulsifiers, stabilizers, gums, and modified starches are often byproducts of other food manufacturing processes. They are cheap and they impart qualities to UPF like extended shelf life, enhanced flavor, or a desired texture. Again, they are in UPF food, but these ingredients are NOT FOOD. The Brazilian scientists explained the bag of sugar in the kitchen was likely a sign that people in the household spent time preparing meals from scratch, thus minimizing these synthetic ingredients in the household’s diet.

Chris Van Tulleken’s Ultra Processed People is a life changing read. It is full of fascinating information and ideas on how to identify and reduce UPF in our diets. If my grandmother were around, she would be pleased to see that science has affirmed the importance of home cooking for our health, but she would wonder why it took so long to determine something that made sense to her all along.

For more discussion on the health of ultra-processed foods, see this article.

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