Scientist Adds Nutrients to Ultra-Processed Foods in Major Study

At the end of the month, the evidence was conclusive and damning: people who eat ultra-processed diets eat more calories, and gain more weight, without even trying. It was the first randomized controlled study of its kind, and it changed the way we look at ultra-processed foods. “Whole” food and “plant-based” diets have taken off, and “clean” eating has become more fashionable than ever, as people try to limit their intake of packaged goods.

But learning that people eat about 500 extra calories a day on an ultra-processed diet didn’t convince Hall that convenience foods should be avoided universally.

“What we’re trying to figure out, specifically, is what is it about ultra-processed foods that seems to cause overconsumption and weight gain?” Hall told Business Insider.

He wants to understand exactly why ultra-processed foods do what they do and what – if anything – we can do to make them healthier.

“If you can avoid them, that’s great, but most people can’t,” he said.

So, for over a year now, he’s invited 18 volunteers back to his special Bethesda, Maryland lab to try out some newly formulated ultra-processed meals. By the time the study ends, in 2025, at least 36 people will have tried the reformulated foods, and been monitored for weight gain, as well as hormonal changes.

Hall is testing two big ideas, hoping that perhaps by baking more of the bedrock concepts of nutritional science into ultra-processed food, we can be smarter about our ultra-processed lives and eat healthier the way. .

Ultra-processed foods attack our brain

We’ve known for a long time that ultra-processed foods are associated with all kinds of bad health outcomes, from earlier death, to more strokes, and more heart attacks.

And we know that refined carbohydrates (white bread, sugar), syrupy drinks (soda, juice), and ultra-processed meat (hot dogs) are some of the most dangerous foods in the category.

But whether the entire category—all packaged, ultra-processed foods are inherently bad for us—is still an open question.

One characteristic that separates many ultra-processed foods from their unprocessed counterparts is calorie density. An ultra-processed meal tends to have more calories per bite, without nearly as much fiber as the fresh fare. That could be part of the reason that ultra-processed diets can lead to overeating, said Hall: simply because each bite is rich and high-fat, but not very satiating.

Hall’s second major hypothesis is that ultra-processed foods may drive people to eat more because they are “hyper-palatable”, meaning they are rich in false combinations of fat and salt, or fat and sugar. , or carbohydrates and salts.

Nothing in nature tastes so good to us – mother’s breast milk is one of nature’s “hyper-palatable” foods. “Breast milk can be sweet and fatty at the same time,” said Hall. It may be that we are evolutionarily adapted when these rarer types of compound foods are not available, a hard-wired survival instinct.

When we cook from scratch, it’s almost impossible to include as much sodium and fat as factories do when combining ultra-processed foods. At home, combo dishes can still be hyper-palatable, but sugar and oils tend to counterbalance watery vegetables and grains. In Hall’s landmark 2019 study, only about 40% of the foods on the unprocessed diet were hyper-palatable, while about 70% of the foods on the ultra-processed diet consisted of the high salt ratios “hyper- palatable” in particular, sugar, fat, and carbohydrates.

If the easiest, cheapest and fastest dinner option is to fill your plate with delicious but low-nutrition mouth-watering fare, that’s exactly what you’re going to do. The question is: can we do anything to make hyper-palatable foods a little less harmful?

Change the composition of your plate

For his new experiment, Hall is trying several different techniques to study the link between ultra-processing and weight gain.

One idea: cut back on “hyper-palatable” foods in some ultra-processed meals. So, although the participants may eat more calories in each bite than they would if they were eating an unprocessed meal, they are (possibly) less likely to overeat, as the foods will not so irresistible.

Another idea is to cut calories by adding some non-starchy vegetables to a plate of ultra-processed foods.

“You end up with more salads, for example,” he said.

Normalizing the number of calories people eat when a side of vegetables is added to a convenience meal could change the way we think about how we choose processed foods, and perhaps even the way we do they are manufacturers — if they want to change.

Can fast food ever be healthy?

Hall has a more surgical technique he is also trying in the experiment. He is dissolving fiber supplements into some of the ultra-processed foods – making fiber powder into packaged yogurt, for example – to see if that curbs overeating and improves health outcomes.

This is a simpler idea, and one that could be picked up by the food manufacturing industry if it shows promise. GLP-1 drugs such as Ozempic suppress appetite.)

If ultra-processed foods can really be reformulated for health, I imagine there’s nothing more idyllic than some extra fiber added to frozen treats and yogurt. How about aisles of packaged goods that contain more beans, nuts, seeds, and less sugar than ever before? UPFs could also get a nod from traditional diets that we know work well with, such as Mediterranean foods rich in olive oil, lentils, chickpeas, and citrus, all of which have a relatively long shelf life. experts agree which is good for your heart and longevity. People could eat rice and beans out of a bag, or enjoy a side of vacuum packed veggies, instead of potato chips. There would be more health-promoting options than “plant-based” treats like high-fat pasta, whether home-made or factory-made.

“All the things we’ve known for a long time,” Hall says, are still worth taking into account, no matter how processed your diet is. Look for nuts, seeds, whole grains like oats or quinoa, black beans, hummus, lentils, and – yes – fresh, unprocessed veggies and fruit when you can. Avoid sugary snacks and refined grains. These are “all the things that the dietary guidelines already discuss ad nauseam.”