Fast food is also bad for people who care about health and a shapely figure. There is a belief that the portions in these places are regularly increased. Is it really so? Or maybe fast food has caught the urge to eat healthy?
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What’s it like with this fast food?
Fast food is a bad thing, most of the people asked will say. Everything is correct, however, only when you look at the number of people visiting the places where it is offered. The queues are endless and the ladies at the cash register work at an unprecedented pace. There is a lot of rumor and speculation about the change in the quality of food coming from fast food ‘restaurants’. There is no doubt that fast food is unhealthy and has a lot of fat and salt. I wrote about it in an article answering the question Why don’t McDonalds burgers break down? This is also confirmed by reports published in Preventing Chronic Disease. However, contrary to popular belief, there have been slight changes in portion size and product composition over the years.
Calories unchanged, trans fat reduced
Analysis of the composition of products in three fast food chains showed a constant, but still very high, content of fat, sodium and calories. A surprise was the reduced share of trans fats in French fries for all the analyzed places. However, experts emphasize that reducing the amount of trans fat does not make fast food any better than before, especially if the salt and caloric content is still intimidating. It does not change the fact that campaigns on the harmfulness of trans fats are effective, which is a very important determinant of further actions.
The size of a portion, the amount of calories, fat and sodium in fast food dishes has not changed for over a dozen years.
Same size, but we eat more
It turns out it’s not the serving size that is driving more consumption at fast food bars, but the offering of more ingredients in cheaper kits. Often the price of a single dish is not much lower than the proposed set containing several ingredients. Tempted by such a promotion, we automatically eat more. And it’s not just about calories, we automatically provide ourselves with a large dose of sodium and trans fats, which are the causes of many diseases, such as atherosclerosis and cancer.
We wrote about the harmfulness of salt in the article: How to deal with salt.
As you can see, not all fast food revelations are true. However, despite the campaigns promoting health and valuable food, neither the composition of the offered products nor the number of their supporters has changed significantly. The deadly content of unhealthy fats, salt, as well as calories as well as additives that improve taste, smell and extend shelf life uncompromisingly excludes fast food from a healthy diet.
The photo is from: velkr0 / Foter / CC BY
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