Chris van Tulleken's book reveals the perils of ultra-processed foods

Some books change the way we think. Others change the way we live. Ultra-Processed People is one such book

Ultra-Processed People: Why do We All Eat Stuff That Isn't Food… and Why Can’t We Stop?

Author: Chris van Tulleken

Publisher: Penguin

Pages: 406

Price:  Rs 599

  Chris van Tulleken’s book is the outcome of an experiment in which the author is the lab rat — by choice. The London-based doctor and academic goes on an 80 per cent ultra-processed food diet for four weeks to study its effects on his state of being — on his body and mind.

 

The title of the book, Ultra-Processed People: Why Do We All Eat Stuff That Isn’t Food… and Why Can’t We Stop? , doesn’t quite prepare you for the horrors that lie inside — or, for that matter, all around us: In our kitchen cabinets, in our refrigerators, served in beautiful bowls at our favourite restaurant, in that ice-cream tub bought from that healthy ice-cream place, in that energy bar kept in the bag for the late afternoon snacking at work… and even in probiotic yoghurt.

 

Before all of this, the first question that comes to mind is: What qualifies as ultra-processed food and how do we tell that what we are consuming is ultra-processed? The thumb rule the author offers is: If you do not recognise the ingredients on the food packet, and if those ingredients aren’t something you would find in the kitchen, then consider it to be ultra-processed. For instance, among its ingredients, a packet of wafers in my bag lists “Maltodextrin”, “natural and nature identical flavouring substances”, “anticaking agent” and “flavour enhancers”. I cannot say for sure what each of these ingredients are. Dr van Tulleken’s book has ensured that this packet will remain unopened.

 

He also writes that if it is a food item covered in plastic, then, too, treat it as a sign that it is probably ultra-processed.

 

The author, however, is not a doctor simply listing out the perils of processed food and urging readers to abstain. He doesn’t tell you how to live your life or feed your family. On the contrary. Drawing from Allen Carr’s unconventional self-help book, The Easy Way to Stop Smoking, which asks readers to continue smoking while they read about how bad smoking is, he says readers could, if they feel like trying it, continue consuming the same amount of ultra-processed foods they ordinarily do for as long as it takes to finish his book.

 

A PhD in molecular virology, he delves into the food habits of humans as they once were, and how and when they began to shift, reaching a point where the food industry has turned our consumption patterns upside down. So much so that a sizable population of the world today eats the least of those foods that are good for you.

 

“Over the past 150 years food has become…not food,” he writes. “… It’s an industrially produced edible substance.” Humans, he writes, are eating stuff “constructed from novel molecules and using processes never previously encountered in our evolutionary history…”

 

Such information should alarm us, not just because of how much ultra-processed food there is in our everyday lives but also because of how addictive it is. Worse, in several countries today, ultra-processed food is much cheaper and more accessible than what humans are actually meant to eat. The fact that it is also conveniently available in ready-to-consume or almost ready-to-consume packets doesn’t help either. Hence, he says, the problem of obesity is on the rise in populations across races, genders and age groups, as are other medical conditions, physical and mental.

 

Dr van Tulleken goes through his experiment, starting with ice-cream for himself and his family. It’s a warm autumn day and he is surprised to see that the ice-cream isn’t melting. His conversations with friends who are food-industry insiders as he tries to make sense of why ultra-processed food is made the way it is and why it’s so ubiquitous can trigger a gag reflex. Take that ice-cream, for example. From factory to the truck, then to the supermarket or the ice-cream cart, and from there to the consumer, it has to survive many temperature upheavals — going from something like minus 18 degrees Celsius to minus 5 degrees Celsius to back to 18 degrees and so on. No wonder it is treated with all kinds of emulsifiers, gums and glycerine. What holds it together can well be called gunk.

 

Often in his book, Dr van Tulleken talks of “arms races”— not the political or military kind, but of complex battles of one-upmanship that are inherent in nature. These are “arms races” being waged within and outside our bodies by viruses and bacteria, and the body’s defence mechanism; between predators and the prey; between animals and plants. And now, in the “unfamiliar food environment” we live in, these arms races are powered by the flow of money where “we are the prey”.

 

Dr van Tulleken calls out food corporations such as Nestlé, PepsiCo and Coca-Cola. He speaks of food’s relationship with race identity and race bias. He offers suggestions on what governments can do, and what people can do if they want to stop eating ultra-processed foods. He writes about cravings, which the ultra-processed food industry triggers and feeds on, of the high that comes from binging and the low that comes from still not being satiated— all of which he encounters during his experiment. And he does it all with the academic rigour of a researcher blended with the easy style of a storyteller.

 

Some books can change the way we think. Some can change the way we live. Utra-Processed People is one such book.