Healthy Substitutes for Ultra-Processed Food

Make changing your diet easier and less painful by switching out your ultra-processed food choices with similar but healthier choices.

If you like:

✽ Sugary beverages like soft drinks, colas, sugary coffee drinks, sports drinks, energy drinks, lemonade, and fruit punch. Artificially sweetened drinks like Zero calorie sodas.

Exchange for less processed choices: flavored sparkling water, cold brew coffee, unsweetened tea, herbal tea, milk, 100% fruit juices, vegetable juices, unsweetened coconut water, mineral water, carbonated water, adding lemon or lime to water, filtered water. One of the easiest changes many people make to their diet is ditching the sugary or sugary tasting drinks for water.

✽ Sweet or savory packaged snacks such as potato chips, flavored tortilla chips, bars, donuts and cookies

Exchange for less processed choices: natural meat jerky, plain tortilla chips, fruit, berries, Greek yogurt with fresh or frozen berries or fruit, apples with cheese, cottage cheese and fruit, chopped vegetables, nuts, cheese, dark chocolate, dark chocolate chips with nuts and raisins, sliced tomato with salt, hard boiled eggs, sliced vegetables dipped in salad dressing or cottage cheese, popcorn, leftovers.

✽ Sweetened breakfast cereals and sweetened oatmeal (especially avoid cereals that are in a non-natural form see how they make ultraprocessed food those shapes)

Less processed choices include: some no or low sugar granola cereals with natural grains, bran cereals, oatmeal made at home, anything with natural looking grains in it.

✽ Reconstituted meat products such as fish sticks, some chicken tenders and hot dogs

Exchange for less processed choices: deli rotisserie chicken, all beef hot dogs, sausages made of real meat, chicken tenders made from real chicken chunks.

✽ Baking mixes like stuffing, brownie, corn bread, cake, and cookie mixes

Exchange for less processed choices: Look for healthier mixes that use whole grains and less added sugar; skip the box mixes and print off a simple recipe from the internet to use instead.

✽ Frozen meals like pizza and TV dinners

Exchange for less processed choices: Try to pick frozen meals that are made from whole foods not extruded foods. Use a slow cooker that you can start in the morning or a quick multicooker like an Instant Pot for easier and/or faster meals. Choose thin crust, vegetable crust or whole grain crust pizzas, and swap processed pepperoni for lean protein like chicken or hamburger. Add extra vegetable toppings and extra red sauce on pizza for more tomato goodness. Try making homemade pizza. Do it yourself by making and freezing homemade frozen food. One easy way to do it is to make double or triple batches of food you normally eat, cool the extra down and freeze in airtight bags or containers. Make sure to consider portion size. There are some great recipes on the web if you google freezer meal recipes. Meals like hearty soups, stews, burritos, pulled meats, casseroles, cooked grains, cooked beans and legumes, burgers, lasagna and Mac and cheese freeze well. Dishes that DO NOT freeze well include creamy sauces, hard boiled eggs, mayonnaise based foods, custards and salads.

Charles Frederick Naegele (1857-1944) Boy eating next to bust 1889.

Charles Frederick Naegele (1857-1944), Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

✽ Powdered and packaged instant soups

Exchange for less processed choices: pick chunkier canned soups with real food ingredients. Homemade soups and stews freeze great. It is really easy to make soups from leftovers in an electric pressure cooker or Instant Pot. Basically, you cut up a bunch of food, throw it in one of the new model Instant Pots, punch in the program, and later you have delicious SOUP! There are many suitable recipes online.

✽ Candies and other sweets

Exchange for less processed choices: dark chocolate, chocolate covered nuts, Unreal dark chocolate peanut butter cups, premium ice cream (made from cream), berries drizzled with chocolate or cream, and sweet fruits. Chewing gum may help.

Candy by Susan Fluegel

✽ Packaged breads and buns

Exchange for less processed choices: whole grain breads, breads with minimal ingredients, and cooked whole grains. Get a bread machine and make bread.

✽Energy and protein bars and shakes

Exchange for less processed choices: fruit juices without added sugar, use whey protein powder to make easy homemade protein drink, stock up on beef or chicken jerky with no added sugars, or snack on a piece of fruit for a natural pick me up.

✽ Meal replacement shakes and powders meant for weight loss

Exchange for less processed choices: use whey protein powder in homemade protein drinks, can also use plant proteins or egg white protein.

✽ Boxed pasta products such as mac and cheese, and spaghetti

Exchange for less processed choices: whole wheat pastas, spiralled vegetable pastas, rice, and cooked whole grains.

✽ Ice cream, sweetened yogurt, and cocoa mixes

Exchange for less processed choices: plain yogurt, plain Greek yogurt with added fruit, higher quality ice cream with more cream and less sugar (like Dyers), make your own cocoa mix.

✽ Margarine and other ultra-processed spreads such as sweetened cream cheese

Exchange for less processed choices: butter, olive oil, cold pressed vegetable and nut oils, and unsweetened cream cheese with add on fruits or berries.

* Ann K. "Convenience is vital for me to avoid junk food. I like healthy easy to eat options: hard boiled eggs, apples, bananas, nut bars, cottage cheese, Greek yogurt, string cheese, tuna packets, and celery and peanut butter. For a quick snack, I'll sometimes mix 1 cup plain Greek yogurt with cinnamon and some frozen/fresh berries. Popcorn really helps with salty crunch cravings."

How to make a chilled protein smoothie:

This healthy smoothie is great for breakfast or as a snack.

Use either a blender or a stick mixer (I recommend stick mixer since it is a snap to clean).

Add: 0.5-1.5 cup of fresh or frozen fruit (I like frozen berries like blueberries, strawberries and raspberries), peaches, oranges and nectarines are good too. Some people add 1 cup ice instead of frozen fruit.

Dump in a protein source: protein powder (whey, egg or plant based powders or isolates), can add chia seeds, flax seeds, hemp hearts, nut butters, Greek yogurt or others.

Liquid: add 1/3-1.5 cup of liquid, common choices include water, milk, fruit juice, plant drinks, coconut milk etc. I use homemade kefir in mine which is low in milk sugar - the kefir bacteria and yeast consume lactose.

Optional ingredients:

Sweetener: I don't use sweeteners since I use sweet berries, but some people like to add honey, agave, maple syrup, coconut sugar or regular sugar. If you want to use a no calorie sweetener it is best to stick with natural ones like yacon syrup or monk fruit sweetener. You can start with a sweetener in your smoothie and gradually decrease it to get used to a less sweet shake too.

Greens: You can add spinach, swiss chard or other dark greens to the shake. Be careful, some greens will make it bitter. Be careful if you are sensitive to oxalate acid.

Fiber source: add high fiber ingredients such as flax seeds, chia seeds, raw flaked oats, berries, pears, nuts and seeds.

Blend until smooth for a quick healthy meal replacement shake.

Frederick Batcheller, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

Oxalate acid warning: Some people don't react well to the oxalates found in greens like spinach. Oxalates, or oxalate acid, are naturally occurring organic salts called dicarboxylic acids (HOOC-COOH) found in many plant foods. Your body can also make oxalate acid as a metabolism product (Avila-Nava et al. 2021).

Foods extremely high in oxalate acid include: spinach, rhubarb, chard, soy, snap beans, rice bran, buckwheat, almonds, cocoa powder, and baked potatoes with skin. For a more complete list of oxalate acid in foods see this handy searchable data base of oxalate content in foods.

Oxalates can bind minerals and make them unavailable for you to use (calcium, zinc, iron, and magnesium); displace sulfur by binding to sulfur receptors; activate mast cells; contribute to kidney stones; and form crystals that build up and cause joint and body pain.

Your body can break down and remove oxalate acid. To help remove excess oxalates take some dietary precautions. Drink water to flush out oxalates. Take calcium (or consume calcium rich foods), which bind to oxalates and remove them from the body. Replace some raw leafy greens with cooked greens. Cooking lowers the oxalate content.

José Ferraz de Almeida Júnior Boy with a Banana oil on canvas c1897.

José Ferraz de Almeida Júnior, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

Warning: don't add banana to your berry smoothie. Bananas contain high amounts of polyphenol oxidase (PPO), a enzyme that interferes with your ability to absorb flavanols. People consumed two different smoothies; banana (high in PPO) or mixed berries (low in PPO); and took a flavanol capsule at the same time. When the researchers measured flavanol levels in blood and urine samples they found that the banana smoothie decreased flavonols by 84% compared to the mixed berry smoothie (Ottaviani et al. 2023).

It is fine to eat your banana at a different time.

Choices begin at the supermarket

If you want to make better food choices try these tips before your next supermarket trip:

Make a list of what you need. Bonus: this will help you plan meals and save money by shopping sales.

Eat before you go to the grocery store. Hungry people make poor choices.

Skip aisles or parts of the store that are too tempting for you. You don't have to go down every aisle! Luckily most supermarkets cluster their products so you can easily reach the produce section without wheeling past the Cheeto section.

A good technique is to skirt around the outside aisles where most stores have their produce, milk and meat and only go into inner aisles if you need something.

*Names and some minor identifying deta+ils in all stories in this website are changed to protect people's privacy.

This information is for informational purposes only and does not constitute medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment.

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