42 of the Most Processed Foods in Your Grocery Store
Ultraprocessed foods give grocery consumers little choice
Most U.S. grocery stores seem to offer endless options in their aisles, which are full of cereals, pastas and baked goods available in hundreds of shapes and flavors. But a closer look at these foods’ ingredient lists shows that in some ways, there’s not much choice at all. A recent study found that most of the products on our grocery shelves have one big thing in common: they’re highly processed.
Grocery stores, not fast-food outlets or convenience stores, are the primary source of ultraprocessed foods in U.S. diets. Such foods are made using industrial processes and ingredients that aren’t found at home. To measure just how prevalent these foods are on shelves, researchers used a machine-learning algorithm to analyze more than 50,000 items at three major chain stores that sell groceries in the U.S.: Whole Foods, Walmart and Target. The results, published in Nature Food, revealed that highly processed options dominated the inventory at all three retailers. But Walmart and Target stocked a higher proportion than Whole Foods, which offered a slightly greater variety of minimally processed choices.
Having a wide array of brands available gives shoppers the “illusion of choice,” says study co-author Giulia Menichetti, a statistical and computational physicist at Brigham and Women’s Hospital and Harvard Medical School. Despite the variety in their packaging, most ultraprocessed foods share a common formula: they’re high in sugar, salt and oil, and they typically contain additives that enhance their flavor, color and shelf life. Certain industrial processes also alter the texture of the raw ingredients, and these steps can strip foods of their nutrients.
