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Top 10 Unhealthy Processed Foods

Thursday, July 4, 2013 18:04

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(Before It's News)

The popularity of processed food on the rise, especially amongst children. The main reason is that it’s delicious and affordable to buy. However, with all the sugar, salt, preservatives and fat, processed food are not something you want to eat if you want to stay health. Even though the temptation is strong and many times it’s much simpler to eat them than go for a healthy alternative, you should try to avoid them as much as possible.

The top 10 most unhealthy processed foods:

10. Chicken Nuggets

They are readily available in restaurants, fast food joins, and supermarkets. Despite being tasty andsucculent, they are unhealthy for you. You would rather consume grilled skinless chicken breast or chicken strips if you want to eat chicken meat.

For example, most people believe that a chicken nugget is just a piece of fried chicken. They are totally wrong. Did you know, for example, that a McDonald’s Chicken McNugget is made of 56% corn?

What else is in a McDonald’s Chicken McNugget? Besides corn, and to a lesser extent, chicken, Studies show that there are thirty-eight ingredients that make up a McNugget one of which I’ll bet you’ll never guess. The ingredients were are referring to are synthetic ingredients, quasi-edible substances that ultimately come not from a corn or soybean field but form a petroleum refinery or chemical plant. These chemicals are what make modern processed food possible, by keeping the organic materials in them from going bad or looking strange after months in the freezer or on the road.

9. French Fries

Extremely popular, but very few realize the amount of calories contained even in the smallest serving of French fries. Besides high calories, it offers very little nutritional value for your body. Try to avoid eating french fries as they are linked to obesity and raised blood sugar level.

The McDonald’s “french fry” lawsuit was the biggest stories in the fast food movement in the 1990s. The class action lawsuit originated after it was discovered that the fast-food chain had not told vegetarians that its french fries and hash browns were cooked in beef broth, contrary to the impression some had after a company press release of July 23, 1990, which stated that McDonald’s fries were cooked in 100 percent vegetable oil.

8. White rice

Oh yeah! White rice. You probably thought it was healthy because so many Asian establishments serve their meals with rice. Not many people know that it is a type of processed food. Plus a lot of people prefer white rice because it is easy to cook and inexpensive to buy, but just like other processed foods white rice offers very little nutrition value to the person eating it. If you want to remain healthy consider purchasing wild or brown rice, even though it is more expensive and takes longer to cook.

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7. Processed meat

According to the World Cancer Research Fund, processed meats are too dangerous for human consumption. Consumers are advised to stop buying and eating all processed meat products. Theseproducts include bacon, sausage, hot dogs, sandwich meat, packaged ham, pepperoni, salami and virtually all red meat that come in frozen prepared meals. They are usually manufactured with a carcinogenic ingredient known as sodium nitrite. This is used as a color fixer by meat companies to turn packaged meats into a bright red color so they look fresh.

6. Blended Coffee

Most of the blended coffees from your local coffee shop without the added cream contains approximately 300 calories.If you want to remain healthy avoid blended coffee drinks. Black coffee on the other hand contains 5 calories. So, if you love to start a day with a cup of coffee, make sure you go for a black one.

5. Potato chips

People love to eat potato chips as a regular snack not knowing that they are undermining their health. Potato chips are rich in preservatives, salt and calories and provide little or no nutritional value.

4. Sugared cereals

A number of households use cereals for breakfast and most of them are rich in added sugars and contain preservatives and lack dietary fiber. When purchasing your breakfast cereals go for the cereal types that contain less sugar and provides lots of fiber.

3. Hot dogs

The vast majority of hot dogs and other highly processed meats on the market contain loads of salt, MSG, sodium nitrate and other preservatives, artificial flavors, cheap unhealthy fillers, and mechanically separated meat and poultry. Most people don’t realize that mechanically separated meat has been so highly processed under extreme heat and pressure that whatever nutritional value it had to begin with is lost in the processing.

2. Margarine

It is an unhealthy alternative to butter and lots of people add it to their meals. If you want to be healthy, don’t be one of those who eats it. Margarine is full of trans fats that is linked to many health related problems.

1. Soda

Nothing is as dangerous to your diet as drinking sodas; they are basically empty calories. Moreover, they contain substances that could hurt your body. As if sugar was not enough, almost all sodas today use high fructose corn syrup (HFCS) as a sweetener and this is a thousand times worse than sugar. HFCS can be damaging to the liver and can cause blood glucose spikes even worse than normal table sugar would. Soda pop is a primary contributor to the obesity problem all across the world.

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Comments

Total 1 comment

Etsi Kona

I get an A+ on this one. I do not partake of almost all of these products. I am guilt of a chip occasionally. The others are not part of my life.

Jul 5, 2013, 11:01 am 0 Reply