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How America got hooked on ultraprocessed foods

nytimes.com

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Re: How America got hooked on ultraprocessed foods

#81

Post by nradov »

vector_spaces wrote: post #65
nradov wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The SF Bay Area is hardly an outlier. There may be more specialty grocery stores here, but the large supermarkets where most consumers buy most of their food are the same as anywhere else. If you compare a Safeway in Mountain View, CA to a Publix in Daytona Beach, FL or a Kroger in Toledo, OH there isn't much difference in the products available.

I hope that you recognize that your casual-outsider evaluation of the assortments of these stores is deeply flawed and not based on actual data. If you think about it even just a little bit, you'll recognize that it wouldn't make sense for a supermarket in one of the highest median income cities in the country to have assortment parity with a chain targeting cost conscious shoppers. The devil here is in the long-tail…

I hope you recognize that your claims are deeply flawed and don't align with the reality that most middle-class grocery shoppers experience. Regardless of what you think makes "sense", major supermarkets throughout the country have rough assortment parity (with minor differences for regional consumer preferences). In some cases the long tail is actually longer in lower median income cities because labor is cheaper and stores are physically larger (cheaper real estate). That Publix where I shopped in Daytona Beach is enormous.

Instead of making things up you can just go look. Many supermarkets have online ordering now so you can see exactly what they stock at each local store.

Re: How America got hooked on ultraprocessed foods

#82

Post by seemaze »

vector_spaces wrote: post #71
nradov wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Food deserts do exist but appear to have no meaningful effect on eating habits. https://news.uchicago.edu/story/food-deserts-not-blame-growi...

You made a claim that plain yogurt is generally available in US food markets, attempting to make an inference about grocery store selections drawing from your own experience. I pointed out that it is not actually generally available and noted that your experience does not generalize. I am not sure why you mention eating habits, since this is not what is being discussed

Food deserts appear to roughly correlate inversely with population density[0]. I don't interpret the existence of food deserts as evidence that food choice is not 'generally' available. Assuming we are serving people and not geographies.

[0]https://vividmaps.com/us-block-level-population-density/

Re: How America got hooked on ultraprocessed foods

#83

Post by newfriend »

vector_spaces wrote: post #33
SirFatty wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"...how hard it is to find healthy food options compared to the unhealthy ones." Sure, if you limit your purchases to Dollar General and Casey's. If you spent time in an actual grocery store, you'd find that your comment isn't true.

In large swaths of the country, these "non-grocery stores" are a lifeline, as they are the only option. In others, you don't even have that -- gas station convenience stores might be that lifeline instead. [1] I am familiar with what the grandparent is referring to, having spent a decade running purchasing teams in US grocery stores. Even in urban areas with many different food retail stores, a typical supermarket in…

This just doesn't align with reality; your chart is practically meaningless.

Yes, in rural areas you often need to drive further than 1 mile to get to a grocery store. That doesn't mean that normal food doesn't exist for these people.

Re: How America got hooked on ultraprocessed foods

#84

Post by kulahan »

nradov wrote: post #17
pchristensen wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Don't forget non-perishable. If you're already having a hard time affording groceries, it really hurts to throw away wilted veggies or moldy fruit.

Canned and frozen vegetables are also non-perishable. While some extremely poor people lack a working freezer or storage space, most consumers can easily use these options.

Absolutely nothing I've seen anywhere justifies the idea that access to food is the problem. In most cultures, you don't need cooking classes because the food is ingrained into their culture, and recipes are passed down. Americans have a much weaker link to their heritage. You might know a few dishes, but in my experience, absolutely nobody knows how to cook.

By cook, I don't mean "can add one box of prepared goods to another box of prepared goods with a can of prepared goods on the side", I mean buying meat, veggies, fruit, and grains and cooking a dish from home, mostly from scratch.

edit: 13 million Americans are in food deserts. If the problem were that small, it'd be similar in size to people who are addicted to substances other than alcohol. This is affecting almost everyone. There MUST be another, bigger solution.

Re: How America got hooked on ultraprocessed foods

#85

Post by jay_kyburz »

jjtheblunt wrote: post #27
Insanity wrote: post #2

As a European who moved to Canada and spends a fair amount of time in the States, one thing that really surprised me is how hard it is to find healthy food options compared to the unhealthy ones. Food was a bit of a concern before moving, but I didn't know just how frustrating it would be. Even something as simple as Yogurt is usually insanely sweet / sugary compared to European variants. Ingredients that are banned…

just as a datapoint: we learn to carefully (compulsively perhaps) read labels stateside, for all the reasons you mention. i.e., these same revelations and frustrations are shared by a huge swath of people born in the States (probably Canada too), and it is indeed a pain in the neck being continually paranoid about what nutritional rubbish is included in ingredient lists.

Food labels in the US and Canada suck as well compared to the UK and Australia. How big is a serve, who's percent daily value? Those numbers just aren't useful.

Here in Australia we have a column for grams per 100g by weight. It makes it much easier to compare foods.

Re: How America got hooked on ultraprocessed foods

#86

Post by apparent »

enraged_camel wrote: post #11
Herring wrote: post #5

For convenience, my rice cooker has been a godsend. I'm basically making homemade chipotle bowls every day.

Rice cooker is great. I also use my Instant Pot a ton. Incredibly convenient and an invaluable time saver.

We use our IP to make yogurt (discussed in depth above). Easy to make and when strained, better than any store bought Greek yogurt.

Also decent for sous vide. I use a big glass jar instead of plastic bags, which are a health concern.

Re: How America got hooked on ultraprocessed foods

#87

Post by vel0city »

Jensson wrote: post #51
thatfrenchguy wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I mean, Whole Foods targets upper middle class folks, you’re far away from the average American experience

Yeah, when I visited USA I was shocked to find lots of larger "grocery stores" didn't even stock the basics. In Europe that isn't a thing, everything larger than a regular room has fresh vegetables and meat and other staples, even in immigrant areas. Sure it might be possible to find that in USA as well, but its so much harder as not every store has it.

What kind of "basics" did you find missing in actual grocery stores, and what were the actual stores in question?

Re: How America got hooked on ultraprocessed foods

#88

Post by kulahan »

Der_Einzige wrote: post #37
dfxm12 wrote: post #4

They're cheap, easy to find and easy to prepare. With grocery prices going up, what little progress has been made might get reversed, unfortunately. Making America healthy again means making non-ultraprocessed groceries available to everyone & cheaper, and ensuring that working families have time to cook. Pressuring Coke to create a new product with sugar is not going to move the needle.

You can make America far more healthy by doing the following: 1. Mandating lower amounts of sugar, and significantly switching to zero calorie non glycemic sweeteners. 2. Removing plastic packaging and eliminating sources of microplastics and other endocrine disruption contamination of our food supply/ 3. Banning most of the stuff that the European food agencies ban 4. Getting GLP-1's in the hands of every overweight…

I couldn't possibly disagree with your last point harder. What's with people and blindly trusting that the pharma companies found a holy grail medicine and didn't rush it to market well before the necessary research is in?

Even more than that, dosing hundreds of millions of Americans for life is one insanely expensive and ridiculous solution.

Side note, is there good research on the effects of microplastics on the body? I'm holding out adding that to my plate of concerns until this is the case, and last I heard we were pretty in-the-dark on the topic.

Re: How America got hooked on ultraprocessed foods

#89

Post by hvb2 »

wenc wrote: post #72
Insanity wrote: post #2

As a European who moved to Canada and spends a fair amount of time in the States, one thing that really surprised me is how hard it is to find healthy food options compared to the unhealthy ones. Food was a bit of a concern before moving, but I didn't know just how frustrating it would be. Even something as simple as Yogurt is usually insanely sweet / sugary compared to European variants. Ingredients that are banned…

As a Canadian living in the US, I’d say your sentiment depends on where you live and what you’re willing to pay. In the Seattle area there are overpriced grocery stores like PCC and Met Market that sell healthy food at a premium. There is also Whole Foods. Even normal grocery stores like Safeway and Kroger have a ton of healthy foods — you just have to read the label. The one thing you have to know if that American g…

> they carry way more SKUs

Not compared to France :) you can buy a dishwasher a tv and stuff for your car all in the same supermarket...

Don't ask me why, just stating a fact

Re: How America got hooked on ultraprocessed foods

#90

Post by arrozconcosas »

nradov wrote: post #12
Insanity wrote: post #2

As a European who moved to Canada and spends a fair amount of time in the States, one thing that really surprised me is how hard it is to find healthy food options compared to the unhealthy ones. Food was a bit of a concern before moving, but I didn't know just how frustrating it would be. Even something as simple as Yogurt is usually insanely sweet / sugary compared to European variants. Ingredients that are banned…

Every grocery store where I've shopped has yogurt with no added sugar. It's right there on the shelf, just look at the label. Antibiotic resistance is a concern but the FDA has made progress in that area. https://www.fda.gov/animal-veterinary/safety-health/antimicr... The EU bans routine antibiotic use for promoting animal growth but antibiotics are still widely used for other purposes. https://www.ema.europa.eu/en/n…

They exist but are a small minority of the shelf. You have to really look for them.
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