Does veganism have an ultra-processing problem?

https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20241011-what-explains-increasing-anxiety-about-ultra-processed-plant-based-foods

by belter • 2 years ago

52 103 2 years ago

thyristan2• 2 years ago

We do mostly have a problem with ultra-unspecific, ultra-unsubstantiated, ultra-agenda-driven and ultra-useless nutritional advice.

The lacking proper definition of ultra-processed foods is just one part of it. How much is "much"? How often is "occasionally"? What is the confidence level and effect size of that advice? What are the alternatives?

apwell233• 2 years ago

Everytime there is a post about upf, there is always someone trying some pedantic " but what exactly is processing"

Article acknowleges the issue with definition and there a section titled 'Identifying ultra-processed foods'. Why not just run with it .

fiddlerwoaroof2• 2 years ago

The definition given there is pretty useless, imo:

In the Nova system, a food product is considered ultra-processed if at least one of its ingredients is a substance that home cooks generally don't use (such as high-fructose corn syrup or hydrolysed protein), or is an additive designed to increase the product's appeal (such as a thickener or emulsifier).

Whether or not home cooks use an ingredient has little to do with the health of that ingredient. And, at least from the abstract of the linked article, the additional details don’t inspire confidence that this is a meaningful category.

“Processed foods” is yet another example of the trend of giving something vague a name, attaching an emotional valence to the name and then using that anti-scientific emotional valence to influence public policy. (See also the politics of nuclear power)

lotsofpulp• 2 years ago

Why not just run with it .

Because it is a waste of time at best, and disinformation at worst.

thyristan2• 2 years ago

Because the definition given is useless. Additives I wouldn't use as a home-cook, thickener or emulsifier make it ultra-processed.

So anything with a thickener or emulsifier is ultra-processed? So now my potato-soup is ultra-processed because potato-starch acts as both (same with any kind of beans/lentils/starchy things)? What about that sauce where I intentionally add starch or flour? That pasta, where the cooking water emulsifies the sauce? That mayonaise where mustard and egg yolk act as an emulsifier? Risotto, where the rice starch thickens? What about roux? Reductions? Blood? Thickening with paprika powder?

By definition practically everything home-cooked is also ultra-processed. Anything containing any kind of starch is ultra-processed. This is either a completely useless definition, or the actual message is "don't cook food, ever".

formerly_proven• 2 years ago

The UN FAO definition cited above still at the very least sounds like a slightly dressed up version of "industrialized food production bad" (nevermind that it is responsible for all of the wins against malnutrition in the world). "a series of industrial processes, many requiring sophisticated equipment and technology" - like literally any industry? "fractioning of whole foods into substances" - like milling flour or extracting corn or potato starch from said plants? "assembly of unmodified and modified food substances using industrial techniques such as extrusion" - like extruding pasta? "use of additives at various stages of manufacture whose functions include making the final product palatable" adding stuff to make taste more godder describes literally any kind of food preparation? "sophisticated packaging, usually with plastic and other synthetic materials"?

Hello, are you describing oreos or dried pasta from 1950 here?

pessimizer2• 2 years ago

Such a dogshit definition makes it impossible to target any specific chemical or process. With that definition and a meal, I can't tell you whether that meal is "ultra-processed" or not. Just tell me the processes, and show me the studies on them. If there aren't studies on them, do studies on them. But talking about "processed" foods actually seems to use generalization as a smokescreen that somehow still allows deceptive labeling, an enormous number of chemicals, and no specific criticism of the industry.

Food preservation is important, Fortifying foods with vitamins can be awesome. It's good when foods are cheap, food "preparation" and food "processing" are the exact same thing in English. There's always going to be processing. Finding out which processes can cause disease or ill-health is reasonably straightforward, if you want to do it rather than throw around political and marketing rhetoric.

72% less processed!

polmos5• 2 years ago

I’ve long advocated for nutrition labels to include what I call “antinutrition” information.

Things like high oxalate content that, without hydration, can put you at risk of kidney stones.

As a ~vegan I once contracted gout!

What that taught me (via internet knowledge shares, the doctors were completely stumped) was an excess of nutritional yeast.

The daily recommended amount was 3-4 tablespoons per day. I was easily eating 15.

Apparently nutritional yeast has a thing called purines, also found in red meat, and is a cause for gout.

Cut it down to normal consumption levels, and the problem went away.

https://multimedia.efsa.europa.eu/drvs/index.htm

Some of the entries in this public nutrition database have daily maximum values.

That information needs to be more readily available.

namaria3• 2 years ago

Apart from ethical or environmental concerns, one of the best decisions you can make nutrition wise is to vary your intake a lot and one of the worst is to try and subsist on a limited range of foodstuffs.

tzs• 2 years ago

The article links to a definition of ultra-processed foods.

abdullahkhalids6• 2 years ago

Real world phenomena can never be cut by clean lines. This isn't math definitions. That said, there are fairly comprehensive definitions of these things. The UN's FAO defines ultra processed food as:

Formulations of ingredients, mostly of exclusive industrial use, made by a series of industrial processes, many requiring sophisticated equipment and technology (hence ‘ultra-processed’). Processes used to make ultra-processed foods include the fractioning of whole foods into substances, chemical modifications of these substances, assembly of unmodified and modified food substances using industrial techniques such as extrusion, moulding and pre-frying; use of additives at various stages of manufacture whose functions include making the final product palatable or hyper-palatable; and sophisticated packaging, usually with plastic and other synthetic materials. Ingredients include sugar, oils or fats, or salt, generally in combination, and substances that are sources of energy and nutrients that are of no or rare culinary use such as high fructose corn syrup, hydrogenated or interesterified oils, and protein isolates; classes of additives whose function is to make the final product palatable or more appealing such as flavours, flavour enhancers, colours, emulsifiers, and sweeteners, thickeners, and anti-foaming, bulking, carbonating, foaming, gelling, and glazing agents; and additives that prolong product duration, protect original properties or prevent proliferation of microorganisms.

This definition makes most sense when compared with the definitions of the other three categories [1]. I am pretty sure, that any two people trained on these definitions will only disagree less than 5% of the time.

[1] https://openknowledge.fao.org/server/api/core/bitstreams/527...

treflop• 2 years ago

You’re missing the point. It’s not defining what constitutes ultra processed — it’s that no one really knows if it’s bad for you.

Because when you study people who eat a certain thing, they also all tend to eat another thing.

I religiously read nutrition labels and a lot of vegan ultra-processed foods are not particularly healthy, but not necessarily because they are ultra processed but because they mimic non-vegan foods which themselves are unhealthy.

Even if you cook all your meals, it doesn’t mean that you are eating healthy because it still depends on your ingredients.

And as the article hinted to, a lot of people who initially start eating vegan foods tend to buy non-vegan analogues which are not healthy. The better analogues tend to be ultra processed. Are these people at higher risk of certain diseases because they are eating ultra processed foods or because they’ve limited themselves to unhealthy vegan substitutes? Hard to say.

cat_plus_plus2• 2 years ago

Mmm... I love my food with proliferation of microorganisms!

Aerroon• 2 years ago

This study made me question the Ultra Processed Food narrative: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/31105044/

Subjects were instructed to consume as much or as little as desired. Energy intake was greater during the ultra-processed diet (508 ± 106 kcal/day; p = 0.0001), with increased consumption of carbohydrate (280 ± 54 kcal/day; p < 0.0001) and fat (230 ± 53 kcal/day; p = 0.0004), but not protein (-2 ± 12 kcal/day; p = 0.85).
Weight changes were highly correlated with energy intake (r = 0.8, p < 0.0001), with participants gaining 0.9 ± 0.3 kg (p = 0.009) during the ultra-processed diet and losing 0.9 ± 0.3 kg (p = 0.007) during the unprocessed diet.

Maybe the issue isn't the 'ultra processing' but protein amount? Less protein = people eat more = weight gain = health issues.

loeg2• 2 years ago

At the end of the day, it's CICO. But why do people eat more calories than replacement? I think it's pretty obvious some of the blame is hyperpalatability, which overlaps greatly with the category people call ultra-processed. The issue is that it tastes good, though, not how many times it has been transmuted.

polmos5• 2 years ago

This is carnivore cope.

Ultra processed food eaters have an ultra processed food problem.

I eat a ~vegan diet. (~vegan meaning someone a vegan would refuse to call a vegan, but that anyone else would call a vegan, ie. I eat honey)

I cook all of my food, and it’s all fresh produce, spices, evoo, quinoa, and oats.

apwell233• 2 years ago

I cook all of my food, and it’s all fresh produce, spices, evoo, quinoa, and oats.

Are you on low protein diet ?

polmos5• 2 years ago

I eat in excess of the daily recommended protein amount for my age, body weight, and activity level because I weight train.

My protein comes from beans, quinoa, oats, vegetables, and nutritional yeast.

stevebmark2• 2 years ago

In the year of our lord 2024 I am baffled that anyone doesn't know about the protein content of quinoa, oats, and other starchy grains.

FeistySkink• 2 years ago

Why not just call your diet plant-based then?

polmos5• 2 years ago

You are free to call it whatever.

I am without allegiances.

GrantMoyer3• 2 years ago

Bees aren't plants.

More seriously, if they follow a nearly vegan diet for ethical reasons, except they don't give a shit about bees, it makes sense to describe their choice as approximately vegan, rather than plant based, because it is approximately vegan.

Klonoar• 2 years ago

Because most people to this day don't know what the hell "plant-based" means. Products in the market often dilute this term too, unfortunately.

abdullahkhalids6• 2 years ago

A 2021 French study found that ultra-processed ... accounted for 37% and 39.5% of energy intake for vegetarians and vegans ... 33% figure for meat eaters [1].

The data suggests that in whatever population the study sampled from all types of food eaters are eating roughly the same amount of ultra-processed food.

That said, I agree with you that the numbers are too high. I eat meat, cook my own food, and I am pretty sure my percentage is less than 10%.

[1] Deleted shoddy analysis in the article.

imjonse• 2 years ago

I heard someone with a similar diet jokingly refer to himself as a 'fuck the bees vegan'

aziaziazi4• 2 years ago

Yeaaah that sound like "fuck the black-humanist". This guy eats want he wants but his self definition is weird and rude.

IWeldMelons8• 2 years ago

News flash - vegans and vegetarians do not need "meat substitutes", as we do not crave meat. Difference between 33% (non-vegetarian) and %39 (vegan)percent of "UPF" is trivial, and probably won't matter and will be offset by lack of carcinogens prevalent in fried meat etc.

abdullahkhalids6• 2 years ago

Doesn't frying anything, including vegetables, create carcinogens? Besides, plenty of meat eating cultures that rarely fry meat.

IWeldMelons8• 2 years ago

Frying meat creates more carcinogens AFAIK; my point was not that though, I was arguing that ultraprocessed herbal food is not same processed meat food, almost certainly less harmful, as it does not require as much nitrites etc.

michael9423• 2 years ago

I don't think you can speak for all vegans and vegetarians.

I was vegetarian for a couple years until meat cravings became so strong I started eating meat again.

84% of vegans and vegetarians return to meat: https://www.psychologytoday.com/intl/blog/animals-and-us/201...

Many because they crave it.

Several vegan influencers have been caught eating meat and fish secretly. Conversely the same - some carnivore influencers have been caught eating fruit and other plant products.

Only 2% of US-Americans are truly vegan or vegetarian (and even those tend to cheat here and there).

IWeldMelons8• 2 years ago

I am sorry to hear that, but your experience actually conforms what I said, only those who transition needs the fake meat substitute. I have about 12 years of vegetarian experience, and after 0.5 years of switching |I stopped having any cravings.

I have no way to verify your statements about cheating, but I personally do not cheat, as I have no need in it, but my advice to everyone who crave meat to stop torturing themselves and it imitations, you'll abandon vegetarian/vegan life anyway.

collingreen7• 2 years ago

I don't love the word cheat when applied to veganism since it isn't a diet like vegetarianism.

xnx4• 2 years ago

vegans and vegetarians do not need "meat substitutes", as we do not crave meat

Speak for yourself. I might only have them once/month, but I enjoy the flavors of Impossible Foods and Beyond products.

neilv2• 2 years ago

News flash - vegans and vegetarians do not need "meat substitutes", as we do not crave meat.

This news flash is news to me. Vegetarian diet (and not much ovo nor lacto) for 25+ years.

I eat fake meat almost every day.

And in the summer, when neighbors cook some unidentified real meat on their grill, and it wafts over, I feel a twinge of carnivore frenzy, ready to fight them for their kill, with my claws and teeth.

0xDEAFBEAD3• 2 years ago

I tried going vegan once. I found my craving for a burger increased the longer I went without. That told me I was suffering a nutritional deficiency. I don't observe the same increase in cravings over time for generic tasty food like chocolate cake.

(I suspect it was the heme iron in the burger btw)

IWeldMelons8• 2 years ago

I think you are torturing yourself and need to stop. I have no craving for meat, and occasionally, when I am forced to eat by cooks mistake or for social reasons (funerals etc.) I feel uncomformatable as if I've eaten soap.

downut• 2 years ago

I've been cooking community dinners for nearly 50 years, including, for most of that, for vegetarians/pescatarians/vegans. I even was camp cook on 4 week-long raft trips.

It never fails: someone wants a fake turkey, or fake bacon, or fake burgers, or whatever. Unwrap the plastic, heat it up, it sez on the label it's vegan. Also you omnivores are killing the world.

So I now refuse absolutely to cook for vegetarians/vegans. I always did make somebody else buy the fake industrial vegan meat substitutes, and amazingly, I caught friction for that. My wife and I are chemical engineers who have been inside quite a few food processing plants and we refuse to touch the output of those. I will eat potato chips every once in a while but nothing vegan at all. I want my vices honest.

spondylosaurus• 2 years ago

You don't eat anything "vegan"? Potato chips are vegan!

IWeldMelons8• 2 years ago

I apologise, but you sound ultraprovincial, like "dayumn liberals" way. Vast majority of food non-vegans eat is vegan.

brnt• 2 years ago

My wife and I are chemical engineers who have been inside quite a few food processing plants and we refuse to touch the output of those.

Don't hold back!

moribvndvs• 2 years ago

What in the hell does this have to do with the comment you’re responding to?

stevebmark2• 2 years ago

The only relevant study linked in the article is https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lanepe/article/PIIS2666-7...

Plant-sourced UPF contribution showed a positive association [with CVD risk]

The study is using an existing dataset on food recall. That doesn't necessarily the results are correct or incorrect, but it's lower on the pyramid of science quality. There is nothing else of substance in this BBC article.

bsdz2• 2 years ago

I put the article through an SEO external link extractor and I saw many more external links to various studies from various organisations. Why are the other studies irrelevant?

pessimizer2• 2 years ago

Are you going to be specific, or make the person you're replying to do all of the work? They told you what they thought was relevant. If you've reviewed one of the others and found it relevant, say which and why, and ask why they disagree.

loeg2• 2 years ago

Ultra-processing is still not a real thing. There's no consistent definition, there's no good scale of what is more or less "processed" despite the name implying some degree of severity. The actual definition is circular -- "if you already think it's unhealthy, it's ultra-processed."

I'm all for dunking on the vegan lifestyle, but not through pseudoscience.

reliablereason• 2 years ago

There is the NOVA system used to classify food where category 4 is ultra processed food:

Monteiro, C., Cannon, G., Lawrence, M., Louzada, M. L., & Machado, P. (2019). FAO. Ultra- processed foods, diet quality, and health using the NOVA classification system.

But to add to that.. ultra processing is not the issue in itself (well not if you use the definition as described in the NOVA system), the issue is certain steps or ingredients used in certain types of ultra processed foods. So blaming "ultra processing" is technically an over generalisation.

xnx4• 2 years ago

"ultra-processed" is a non-specific scare term for more specific descriptors, most specifically "low fiber". Foods with their fiber removed are consumed faster, keep you feeling full for less time (low satiety), and spike blood sugar more rapidly (higher glycemic index). Seitan (gluten) is a useful source of concentrated protein for those eating a plant-based diet.

GrantMoyer3• 2 years ago

Note that the Nova definition of "ultra-processed foods" includes foods such as tofu and many unsweetened soymilks, along with foods like potato chips and Oreos.

So the article discusses multiple studies which find increased consumption plant origin ultra-processed foods is associated with an increased risk of disease and mortality. Seperately, another study found vegetarians and vegans eat a higher proportion of ultra-processed foods than the general population.

Does the subset of ultra-processed foods of which vegetarians and vegans eat more significantly overlap with the subset which increases risk of disease and death? We don't know; that's not in the data and the article doesn't discuss any articles linking vegetarian and vegan diets to higher risk of disease and death. What if vegetarians and vegans eat a ton more tofu and soymilk but less potato chips and Oreos?

The article sort of adresses this, but not very directly. Also, vegetarian and vegan diets are more of a footnote in the article; it's more about ultra-proccessed foods in typical diets. And the actual article title better reflects the focus, so I wonder why the post changed it so significantly.

abdullahkhalids6• 2 years ago

In the supplementary information of the study, there is a Table that breaks down the 22 food groups [1]. You can look at it yourself, but below are the consumptions for the "unhealthy" categories. Seems like Vegans eat more salty snacks and less sweet/fatty food.

     |                                  | Meat-Eaters   | Vegetarians   | Vegans       |
     |----------------------------------|---------------|---------------|--------------|
     | Salty snacks and crackers  (g/d) | 3.69 ± 0.06   | 5.28 ± 0.34   | 10.50 ± 0.48 |
     | Sweet and fatty foods 6 (g/d)    | 125.00 ± 0.52 | 122.00 ± 2.86 | 73.90 ± 4.00 |
     | Sugary drinks (mL/d)             | 23.40 ± 0.48  | 27.10 ± 2.65  | 22.40 ± 3.71 |
     | Sugar-free drinks (x103 mL/d)    | 1.08 ± 4.16   | 1.14 ± 22.70  | 1.05 ± 31.70 |

[1] https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S002231662...

GrantMoyer3• 2 years ago

Sure, and the study even finds vegetarian and vegan diets have a higher proportion of "healthy" foods overall. But as far as I've found, neither that study nor the other linked articles investigate which of these specific groups of foods are linked to increased risk of disease and death (regardless of how obvious it may seem for some of the groups), only ultra-processed foods in general, which is a very broad category.

adrian_b• 2 years ago

While the concern about "ultra-processed foods" is very valid, I am annoyed that all the articles that I have seen about this subject fail to distinguish between two very different kinds of processing:

1. Processing methods whose purpose is to separate components of the food sources. These range from simple processing like peeling and paring vegetables or filleting and boning meat, to processing that requires more complex industrial installations, like for oil extraction or for making meal/flour out of seeds or for dehydrating vegetables.

2. Processing methods that either mix multiple food ingredients or transform them in various ways, e.g. by heating or whipping.

The processing methods from the first class are both necessary and inoffensive when they are implemented carefully, to avoid modifications and contamination in the food components that are separated. For instance, for oil extraction from oily seeds or oily fruits, valid separation methods are cold pressing or extraction with supercritical carbon dioxide.

Such separation methods are necessary because they enable the cooking of food with optimal nutrient composition and because they greatly reduce the costs for the transport and storage of the food ingredients. This is why the most important of them, like seed milling and edible oil extraction, have been used for many millennia.

On the other hand, the processing methods of the second class, when done industrially instead of being done at home, are almost universally harmful and only the food products that use them are rightfully called "ultra-processed foods".

The reason why such processing methods of the second class are almost always harmful when done industrially, is the conflict of interests between the food vendor, who wants to obtain a maximum profit, and the food consumer who wants a healthy food. These goals are not compatible.

For any vegan who is not doing hard physical work, to enable the consumption of 3000 kcal per day or more, some method for the extraction of pure proteins, either done industrially or at home, is absolutely necessary. So, for example, a protein powder is not an "ultra-processed food", unless it is mixed with undesirable additives, like sweeteners, flavors or colorants (which happens far too frequently, so a buyer must be careful to check the composition).

The easiest and the best way to avoid "ultra-processed foods" is to buy raw food ingredients and cook them at home. Using modern techniques, like cooking in a microwave oven or by using other specialized appliances, it has become possible to cook the food in a very small fraction of the time required when cooking using traditional methods.

Until some years ago, I or another family member was cooking the main dishes for an entire week during a weekend day, because that required many hours, so in the other days the food was only reheated. Now, I can afford to cook most or all of the food for a meal only immediately before eating, because that takes only about a half of hour, of which only about a half of the time is active, e.g. used for peeling/paring vegetables or washing dishes, while the rest is spent in waiting for the food to be cooked in an oven, when I can do other things meanwhile.

cat_plus_plus2• 2 years ago

You will have to pry my pressure cooker out of my cold, dead hands. "Processing" - it's another word for "cooking". Also I love technological progress.

ASalazarMX• 2 years ago

But processed and ultra-processed are different categories of food.

Cooking, dehydrating, pickling, milling, crushing, etc. is usually healthy; decomposing foods into simple, commodity ingredients, and then recombining those into new products, maybe not so.

mensetmanusman• 2 years ago

Processing damages long chain molecules, ie molecular weight decreases.

Whether we evolved to handle this well is under study, but these studies usually have too many confounding variables to make a conclusion.

AStonesThrow• 2 years ago

Everyone knows these lists of produce that enumerate the vitamins and minerals they contain, and other beneficial micronutrients, and so dietary recommendations often say, "try adding X to your diet, because it's high in Ps and Qs!"

But I've become aware of issues like impoverished soil and the concept of terroir. Many crops are grown outside of their natural habitat, and who knows what's gone on with their soil, water, fertilizer, and general environment.

So I would say that whenever these plants were tested for levels of micronutrients, I am dubious that those assessments hold true throughout space and time, especially for minerals that would necessarily be absorbed, rather than vitamins manufactured through biological processes within the organism itself.

So I guess it's not wrong to fortify and process, if you're going to add something back in that should've been there already.

3np• 2 years ago

Unnecessarily editorialized and misrepresentative title.

Original: "What explains increasing anxiety about ultra-processed plant-based foods?"

TFA does not mention "veganism" even once.

JadeNB• 2 years ago

TFA does not mention "veganism" even once.

Though you're right about the headline, I don't think that your claim is true. Here's the first sentence (or maybe it's the caption of the first picture, or maybe it's the subhed? I can't tell):

Vegan diets can contain more UPFs on average – but this might not be a problem.

aniken• 2 years ago

no, processed food has a processing problem

senectus1• 2 years ago

I used to know a Vegan couple that were friends (Falling out over humor of all things) we used to go out to a vegan resteraunt quite often and thoroughly enjoyed the meals. but wow, outside of those meals they both ate terribly. highly processed and deep fried foods was the norm. they rarely ate anything "fresh".

llamajams• 2 years ago

Style nit: This is a badly written article; it about to a series of inconclusive quoted from experts duct taped together.

General observation: Discussions about not eating meat in popular and social media seem to forget that 2/3rds other world don't exist. India, te most populous nation consists of 30~40% vegetarians and the rest have a very low animal protein diet compared to western standards. This is the same for much of east and south asia. The diet is heavily plant based, is healthy, nutritious and delicious, and does not contain much processed ingredients. It has been this way for hundreds if not thousands of years. Animal farming culture is very different and less industrialized. Many countries don't have a dairy industry to speak of even though dairy products are consumed. Whether you're a non meatertarien on nutritional or ethical grounds, the east seems to have an answer for you. So you can stop eating meat...or you know eat less of it and still have a good time. I'm not sure why we in the west keep talking as if it's not possible without having some conglomerate reinvent meat for the 11th time.

Does veganism have an ultra-processing problem?

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