the root cause, at least for bread, is pretty simple; US supermarket bread has a lot more sugar than freshly baked bread, because sugar is a preservative.

Because they use the oil for how it changes the texture, not for the taste. So corn oil is just as good as soy oil is just as good as canola... and they're going to use whatever is cheapest.

In NZ pretty much every supermarket bakes their own bread which to me seems same like bakery or home bread.

Unless you're suggesting that the pita bread you threw out was preserved with formaldehyde, there isn't much of a question here. Taking issue with bread keeping its freshness is in-and-of itself no bad. If you have issue with a specific preservative, perhaps discuss that specificity.

Well if the sugar is ultra-processed, yes it does, doesn't it?

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.

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.

> That fast path is what I think makes sugar particularly problematic

there is no way to separate the discussion, doing so it’s just to avoid solving the issue that is to regulate refined sugar

Refined sugar is extremely concentrated compared to the natural sources. You need like 50 kilos of sugar cane to produce one kilo of refined sugar, and through multiple steps of heavy industrial processes.

You could make a case for honey, but, like all other natural sources, it contains other ingredients that somehow limits ingestion or metabolization.

> Actually carbs are necessary

This is NOT true. Carbs are ONE form of energy that the body can use for fuel. Fat is the other one.

> people with diabetes tried to live on a completely carb free diet - but you cannot do that for long.

I guess you're saying I don't exist?

For about 10 years, I haven't eaten carbs beyond the VERY rare cookie or two every other month and the insignificant trace amounts in above-ground leafy vegetables and the like. I'm not alone, there are lots of us who eat this way. Whole online communities, full of people who each have their own reasons. I did it for general health and fitness reasons, others do it to reverse their type 2 diabetes.

In the 1960s, a man named Angus Barbieri fasted for over a year under medical supervision and suffered no ill effects afterward. Unless you want to believe the whole thing is a hoax and he was secretly snarfing donuts on the sly, he is proof that humans don't NEED carbs.

The planet used to be dotted with cultures that eat animals and fish primarily or exclusively for hundreds to thousands of years. The Inuit, Mongolian nomads, tribes in the Amazon, etc. They mostly don't exist anymore. (But not because of their diet.)

It's not a big group, but there ARE modern people who live on a carnivore diet for years on end and don't appear to suffer any notable long-term effects. Generally these are either extreme keto/paleo adherents, bodybuilders, or those who are trying to manage a medical condition.

> In the past people with diabetes tried to live on a completely carb free diet - but you cannot do that for long.

What is “long?” There are people living years on no carbs at all.

There are no essential carbohydrates. Essential vitamins, minerals, amino acids, and fatty acids, yes. Essential carbohydrates, no.

Maybe you can't imagine it, but lots of people do it all the same.

There is a lot of stuff I can't eat because the amount of added sugar is disgusting.

Yeah there used to be a children’s breakfast cereal called Super Sugar Crisp and the cartoon character promoting it in commercials was named Sugar Bear. Foods in the ‘70s and ‘80s were loaded with sugar.

> Sugar is naturally occurring in basically all the food we consume. Good luck ripping it out. Good luck getting a functioning body without consuming carbohydrates, either.

How do you go from "Sugar should be consumed in moderation" to "Sugar should be ripped out of all foods and the body doesn't need carbohydrates"?

Why jump from a reasonable and sound observation to some ridiculous extreme nobody asked for?

> Good luck getting a functioning body without consuming carbohydrates, either.

The body doesn't need carbohydrates to function.

> The body also requires dietary sugar to function :) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbohydrate

Again, the body does not :) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ketogenic_diet

Nova does not make any judgment on the healthiness of foods, to my knowledge. The problem is that people take the extremely broad classification of UPFs by Nova, infer health detriments, and then cast judgment on the overly broad UPF classification as if everything in that category is equally as bad.

Here's a reminder of the Nova UPF classification:

> Industrially manufactured food products made up of several ingredients (formulations) including sugar, oils, fats and salt (generally in combination and in higher amounts than in processed foods) and food substances of no or rare culinary use (such as high-fructose corn syrup, hydrogenated oils, modified starches and protein isolates). Group 1 foods are absent or represent a small proportion of the ingredients in the formulation. Processes enabling the manufacture of ultra-processed foods include industrial techniques such as extrusion, moulding and pre-frying; application of additives including those whose function is to make the final product palatable or hyperpalatable such as flavours, colourants, non-sugar sweeteners and emulsifiers; and sophisticated packaging, usually with synthetic materials. Processes and ingredients here are designed to create highly profitable (low-cost ingredients, long shelf-life, emphatic branding), convenient (ready-to-(h)eat or to drink), tasteful alternatives to all other Nova food groups and to freshly prepared dishes and meals. Ultra-processed foods are operationally distinguishable from processed foods by the presence of food substances of no culinary use (varieties of sugars such as fructose, high-fructose corn syrup, 'fruit juice concentrates', invert sugar, maltodextrin, dextrose and lactose; modified starches; modified oils such as hydrogenated or interesterified oils; and protein sources such as hydrolysed proteins, soya protein isolate, gluten, casein, whey protein and 'mechanically separated meat') or of additives with cosmetic functions (flavours, flavour enhancers, colours, emulsifiers, emulsifying salts, sweeteners, thickeners and anti-foaming, bulking, carbonating, foaming, gelling and glazing agents) in their list of ingredients.

A few items that stick out like a sore thumb to me regarding healthiness:

* How could sophisicated packaging, usually with synthetic materials impact health?

* How does making something highly profitably necessarily impact health?

* Nova's definition of something with 'no culinary use' is extremely biased in my view. How do specific sugars (each with specific properties that are useful) have no culinary use? How are protein mixes not culinarily useful?

* Nova's definition of 'cosmetic function' is also just.. stupid in my view. Flavors are cosmetic? Emulsifiers are cosmetic? By this definition, adding MSG to a food makes it UPF.

Indeed, they’ll use E numbers to shorten the chemistry catalogue part of the list. Note the law requires sorting ingredients by weight, so these additives end up clumped together. You’ll end up with half a line instead of half a page.

Limited space on the label maybe :D Some of the real names of the E's are very long.

> 4-5 chicken breasts is around 120g a day

Bad math? Per USDA standards, a single boneless skinless chicken breast has ~54 grams of protein; so 4-5 would be ~200-250g of protein.

Because that's grossly outside the norm for the general public, you're not going to find any evidence to support the idea it's a healthy amount for a typical person to consume for a long period of time. And likewise, you'll find little evidence saying what negative consequences it might have, if any.

You're welcome to make whatever assumptions you want to in that case, but there's not a lot of ground for anyone to convince skeptics who disagree with them. It's tenuous assumptions all the way down.

Regardless, in the real world, that also represents 1200-1500 calories of absurdly (mind-numbingly) high-satiety food and quite a lot of slow digestive bulk. Most people simply wouldn't be able to consume that while also eating a varied diet that provides them with adequate long-term nutrition. So it's probably a pretty bad idea for them to dedicate themselves to it, unless -- like some athletes and gym bros -- they have the further discipline to also stuff themselves of all the other stuff they need to eat while also not eating so much that they become overweight. Do you know many people like that? I'm not sure I've met more than a handful in my lifetime.

Whatever the impact of the very high protein consumption itself in some abstract theoretical kind of way, which we're far from having evidence into understanding, it's just terrible advice for the general public because of the secondary effects we might reasonably expect in practice.

It's possible to die of "protein poisoning" but you really have to be in a survival situation with no sources of fat. Hunters and trappers are known to have died this way when only lean meat was available in far northern winters. Maybe this is where the idea came from.

https://www.thelancet.com/journals/ebiom/article/PIIS2352-39...

> Moreover, epidemiological studies show that a high intake of animal protein, particularly red meat, which contains high levels of methionine and BCAAs, may be related to the promotion of age-related diseases. Therefore, a low animal protein diet, particularly a diet low in red meat, may provide health benefits.

Consuming high amount of animal protein was pointed out by the urologist as one of the things I should evade. Apparently that contributes to development of kidney stones. So there’s at least one way in which it’s bad for you.

There are too many variables in diet. If they study steak every meal vs rice and beans every meal they can come up with one. However most people are not that one-tracked either way. Sometimes the rich eat rice and beans, sometimes even poor manage to afford steak. For steak, did I mean beef, lamb, goat, pork... - this might or might not matter. There is also chicken, turkey, snake, deer, elk - and dozens more animals people eat which might or might not be healthy. OF each of the above there are different cuts (does it matter?), different fat levels (does it matter?). And that is just meat, how many varieties of beans are there, what about rice? What about all the other things people eat?

the effect size will not be high

Yes, the most common example would be clinical trials for drugs and other medical treatments- often have thousands of patients (with recruitment being the limiting factor). There are tons of ways that studies can go wrong, for example when patients don't take the treatment and lie (this is common) or have other lifestyle factors that influence the results, which can't be easily smoothed out with slightly larger N.

I don't know how to fix the nutritionist studies- I'm still pretty skeptical that you could ever control enough variables to make any sort of conclusion around things with tiny effect sizes. This isn't like nutritional diseases we've seen in the past, for example if you look at a disease like pellagra (not getting enough niacin), literally tens of thousands of people died over a few years (beri beri, rickets, scurvy are three other examples; these discoveries were tightly coupled to the discovery of essential nutrients, now called vitamins).

Ok, so when does a butcher shop become a factory?

When does a fruit farm become a factory?

Is candied bacon an ultra-processed food?

And even then, things made in a bakery can be made at home so I don't get how your above standard still makes any sense. Is homemade bread with flour milled at home ultra-processed as well? Candied bacon can be made outside of a factory as well. If so, it's not really a "was it made in a factory" argument now was it?

with ultra processed flour and pressed seed oils :)