2023-08-31 05:20:00
It is enough to take a walk through the supermarket to realize that most of the processed and ultra-processed products created by the food industry are intended for a specific public. Our eyes go away after home-made products, and this is nothing more than a nutritional declaration that does not add any extra value to the product. Customers, however, make us believe that it has been prepared with more care, they tell us that surely there is a wonderful cook who could be my grandmother (at least I imagine her like that), making that sauce in a clay pot that it moves away from everything industrial, but that is not the reality. It’s just a claim, and that ketchup is as industrial as the first brand name that comes to mind.
In addition, the entire industry is turning to the vegetable. We are more and more consumers of this type of diet or, at least, those of us who are curious to include a little more vegetable protein in our diet. For this reason, traditional meat and dairy brands have joined this trend, which is welcome, by the way, and, of course, the private labels of the supermarkets themselves have also done so. These products usually have green packaging and reference is made to their vegetable content, but does the fact that it is vegetable indicate that it is healthy? The truth is that no, you have to read the ingredients and discard almost beforehand the products that are copies of the omnivorous options with little nutritional value, such as sausages, nuggets, fish sticks… The green color is also used to try to indicate ” health” and refer to the fact that it is eco-friendly and sustainable, but is quinoa sustainable in Spain? The truth is that no, we are not producers here and this implies a significant carbon footprint and, in turn, an increase in the price of this product where it is a basic cereal, as in Peru.
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Another trend that has flooded supermarket shelves is high protein products; you can find yogurts, dairy desserts (because chocolate-flavored yogurts or pudding versions, yogurts, yogurts are not), vegetable drinks, shakes with higher protein content, protein bread… Actually, do we need these products? Do we know how many are those 16 grams of protein that a yogurt of this type offers us? Do we know our protein consumption how to look for an extra contribution? Where does so much concern about protein come from? It comes from sports nutrition and hyperproteic diets, protein is like the best macronutrient, it is necessary, satiating and has an acceptable caloric intake, not like fat and carbohydrates that are loaded with calories by Beelzebub himself.
The reality is that in the West there is not exactly a protein deficit; If we eat something more, it is protein in the form of meat, fish, eggs, dairy products, cheeses, etc. being an originally omnivorous diet. In other latitudes there is a protein deficit. In nutrition it seems that fashions are being established and, if fats were the enemy before, which had to be avoided almost regardless of their origin (trans fat in a bun is never comparable to vegetable fat in nuts), later it was the sugar. Delirium has reached grim heights so that nutritionists, “influencers” and other daring, to say the least, who seek their likes on Instagram and other platforms, launch messages such as that fruits and vegetables are bad for the liver, or that Vinegar should be drunk before meals to lower blood sugar.
Going back to yogurt, a natural one provides about 10g of protein and skyr, a yogurt of Icelandic origin that has been in supermarkets longer than protein ones, about 14g of protein. As you can see, nothing new under the sun.
High protein products tend to go in black, because they are more related to sports nutrition and, in general, more intended for the male public. We already know that strength is only a matter of men. Without a doubt, my favorites are those from the pink range, those products intended for women who, rather than dedicating themselves to nourishing us, tell us what we have to do with our bodies. The pink range is not something that I have invented, it is a strategy that is used in marketing. They relate the meaning of pink: innocence, sweetness, femininity with products and, in general, these are usually aimed at women. In this range I distinguish two clear lines, one aimed at weight loss and problem areas of our bodies, and the other, at menopause.
In the first we can find everything, from bars full of sugar that replace a meal, infusions to relieve heavy legs or regulate intestinal transit and, incidentally, remove our belly, also fat-eating cookies, pink condensed milk (the same as the normal one, but made with skimmed milk, it is not going to occur to any woman to eat a whole dairy product). These products make it very clear that a woman’s diet is considered as a means to change her body, aesthetics taking precedence over health. In reality, most of these products are not healthy.
In the second line of the pink range, they sell you all kinds of products, but now enriched in calcium, in omega-3… It makes me laugh, because women disappear from society when we reach a certain age, because supposedly we are no longer attractive , but the industry lets us take fat in the form of omega-3, it cares about our bones, our cholesterol and our health… Although in childbearing years, with two bars or a shake we had enough to eat.
NUTRITING WITH SCIENCE is a section on nutrition based on scientific evidence and the knowledge contrasted by specialists. Eating is much more than a pleasure and a necessity: diet and eating habits are right now the public health factor that can most help us prevent numerous diseases, from many types of cancer to diabetes. A team of dieticians-nutritionists will help us to better understand the importance of food and to demolish, thanks to science, the myths that lead us to eat badly.
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