New Online Tool Could Assist in Reducing Ultra-Processed Food Consumption

Ultra-processed foods have come under fire over the last few years due to their links to serious health conditions, such as heart disease, obesity, and cancer. But nearly 70% of the U.S. food supply is ultra-processed, making it tricky to avoid these foods entirely. 

A new resource from a team of researchers across several medical centers and universities, including Northeastern University and Harvard Medical School, attempts to help consumers navigate food processing levels in popular foods to make more educated decisions at the grocery store.

The tool, called TrueFood, breaks down the most and least processed foods found at Whole Foods, Target, and Walmart.

Here’s how the researchers hope people will use it, plus what the site can and can’t tell you.

Before we dive into the tool, it’s important to understand that foods aren’t just considered unprocessed or ultra-processed. Instead, scientists who study food processing often rely on a measurement called the NOVA scale, which divides items into four categories:

Researchers created the tool based on a study published in the journal Nature Food. That research used machine learning to create a database called GroceryDB, which features more than 50,000 foods. 

“TrueFood is a byproduct of the study,” Gordana Ispirova, PhD, study co-author, researcher at Brigham & Women’s Hospital, and a post-doctoral fellow at Harvard Medical School, told Health. “It’s not the first thought we had.”

The database features major food categories you’d see at the grocery store, like mac and cheese, pizza, seafood, bread, and yogurt. Each food in the database is assigned a category, and then a processing score, which is an indication of a food's level of processing. Numbers closest to zero are the least processed.

Each food also has a list of nutrition facts and an ingredient tree that breaks down what goes into the product.

To use TrueFood, you can cruise through a food category to see levels of processing for products that fall into that section. Another option is to type in a product name on the homepage to see how it’s rated.

The goal is to help people use more information than just lumping everything into an ultra-processed category, study co-author Michael Sebek, PhD, an associate research scientist at Northeastern University, told Health.

“If the majority of food is just in one class, how is this categorization helping people distinguish the quality of their food?” he said. “The food [processing] score is there to provide that nuance.”

Sebek said it’s generally best to look for foods closer to zero if you’re concerned about processing. Foods tend to tip into the ultra-processed category when they reach a 70 or higher.  

It’s important to note that foods shouldn’t necessarily be off-limits if they’re processed. “Processed and ultra-processed foods aren’t always bad,” Antonette Hardie, RDN, a dietitian at The Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center, told Health. Again, things like protein powder, plant-based milk, and even some breads fall into this group.

Hardie recommends opting for whole foods like fresh fruits, vegetables, and meats when you can. These foods “are going to be the healthiest and less processed options,” she said. “But that doesn’t necessarily mean that processed foods are bad for us either.”

The TrueFood tool can help you understand why a product is highly processed, but it only features foods found at three major stores. As a result, you may not get the information you need if a product you’re interested in isn’t included.

But for foods that can be found in the database, Ispirova suggests making your decision based on the overall processing score and the ingredients list. 

Beyond that, Hardie said it’s important to know what you’re purchasing. “Always read food labels,” she said.