Do you remember the famous Lays’ potato chip commercial: ‘I bet you can’t eat just one’? While it sounds like a harmless catchphrase on the surface, there’s some diabolical truth to this claim.

Lays hired thousands of food scientists over the years to create the world’s most perfect product — a junk food so addictive that people couldn’t resist one more bite. They discovered the perfect blend of salt, sugar, and fat that created a positive feedback loop, bringing buyers back to the bag over and over without making them feel full.

Lays isn’t the only company engineering food to boost its bottom line. In fact, many of the pre-packaged, processed products lining supermarket shelves are designed to do one thing: keep our stomachs empty and our wallets open.

Highly processed food has only existed since the 1900s, but we’re already seeing its negative effects on our collective health and wellness. Unless we start taking charge over our food and making a difference in what we eat, we’re doomed to watch our weight, metabolism, and rate of disease change for the worse.

Why corporations want to keep you hungry

It’s a common myth that food companies want us to be healthier. The truth is that modern food is designed to make people eat more often. The hungrier you are, the more food you’ll buy, and the more ‘stomach share’ goes to corporations rather than your kitchen table.

Let’s look at it this way: if you’re running a corporation and your job is to make money, the best way to make more is to keep people hungry. It’s important to increase profits for shareholders and board members, and the best way to do that is to get families and their children addicted to ultra-processed foods.

Ultra-processed foods are designed, not grown. The objective goal is to encourage us to crave more without getting sick of ‘just one more bite.’ And the ‘best part’ is that their food margin is extremely cheap. McDonald’s, for example, made a 25% net profit margin in 2022 alone.

Big food companies get us hooked on addictive foods that keep us buying more. But it gets more diabolical than this — not only do they engineer our food and drinks, but they strip out the nutrients that make us feel full.

The poor nutritional content of modern food

The vast majority of processed food isn’t ‘food’ in the historical context. Modified, refined, and transformed beyond recognition, the ingredients are a shell of their former selves and almost unfit for consumption. Processed foods are also less nutritionally dense and burn through our bodies quicker, resulting in slower metabolisms and more frequent hunger cravings that only benefit large organizations.

Saying ‘a calorie’s just a calorie’ no longer holds water. In fact, this wasn’t even a concept prior to the era of processed food. If you asked the scientists of the 1800s about the value of a calorie, they could easily tell you that different food has a different effect on hunger levels, how much you can eat, and how healthy you are. Today, large corporations have distracted us with the myth of CICO, which keeps us focused on ‘burning off’ calories rather than nourishing ourselves with the right nutrition.

The concept of calories only became popular in the 1920s. Big food companies were quick to jump on the bandwagon and pour millions of dollars into studies focused on calories rather than nutritional content.

Again, this was nothing but a distraction. The body doesn’t have a sensor for calories; only one for nutrients. And if we aren’t getting the nutrients we need, we aren’t getting enough food — regardless of the amount we eat.

When you grab takeout or pizza for dinner, you’re filling yourself with calories that lack the essentials you need to survive. You’re putting fuel into your system that barely qualifies as food, then wondering why you’re feeling hungry again shortly after you’ve eaten.

The food industry has accomplished its goal — and you and your family are left holding the check.

Reset your goals to get the nutrition you need

It’s clear that large food companies have no incentive to support your health. Consequently, the only way to avoid the trap of cheap processed food is to avoid it entirely. This means eating nutritionally dense, whole foods that keep you fuller longer and fill your body with essential nutrients.

There are several ways you can take action today:

• Buy foods that are as unaltered as possible. Most grocery stores stock their least processed foods around the exterior of the store (vegetables, meat, dairy, etc.) and place their most processed foods in the center.
• Eat out less often. Restaurants and fast-food places are almost always peddling processed food — frankly, it’s their secret weapon. Cook from scratch as frequently as you can and make discerning choices while out on the town. Remember: there’s nothing wrong with asking for clarification about the ingredients you’re eating.
• Consider cutting certain foods from your diet. If you find yourself constantly chasing salty snacks or highly processed sweets, look for ways you can substitute the flavors with healthier, more mindful foods. There’s no need to go cold turkey right away. Wean yourself off slowly and replace processed foods with real, whole ingredients.

The reality is that the people who make our food have no incentive to make us full, or for that matter, healthy. It’s up to us to stand our ground against organizations profiteering off our health — one meal at a time.

If you’d like to learn more strategies for avoiding processed foods, you’re welcome to join the waitlist for a personalized coaching session. We’ll walk through the reality of the modern food industry, set some guidelines for healthy eating, and explore seven simple ways to improve your health while staying off my operating table.