Do you consider chips & salsa a junk food?

[Anonymous]

My plan is to each chips + guac for dinner once the kids are out of the house.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:There's a new WSJ piece detailing a WSJ editor's journey on Mounjaro (similar to Ozempic). He claims as soon as he jumped off it, the first "bad" food he immediately craved was chips & salsa. Bad? That kind of popped off the page to me.

Am I just naive or is chips & salsa (or chips & guac) really not that unhealthy? Or maybe there are wide variances of tortilla chips people consume and there are some super unhealthy tortilla chips? Or jarred salsas full of tons of sodium?

We make fresh or buy the fresh salsa (or guac) at WF and use organic blue tortilla chips. I honestly never considered it a bad snack.

I consider us a healthy and very active household - we snack on naked baked pita chips and guac or fresh pico on an almost daily basis. Anyone characterizing that as a bad junk food has issues. Also we legitimately prefer pita chips to tortilla chips because they're sturdier for scooping and we enjoy the extra crunch.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My plan is to each chips + guac for dinner once the kids are out of the house.

I buy those large containers of fresh guac from Whole Foods and the kids go through one entire container before sunset.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:total junk food to me.

This is very rigid. As far as snacks go, if an apple is a 1 and a donut or fast food is a 10, I'd put organic chips and fresh pico at maybe a 2 or 3?

[Anonymous]

They’re on the junk food scale but healthier than most other junk foods.

[Anonymous]

Salsa is incredibly healthy. I make mine at home most of the time (it's super easy) and it' just onion, tomato, jalapeños, garlic and cilantro. There's not much to it.

The tortilla chips are not good for you in large quantities, as it's just a fried tortilla. if you have just one, it's fine but having 5 fried tortillas is not stellar.

I grew up eating flour tortillas and butter for breakfast, and I'll still snack on fresh flour when I go home (and bring back dozens for the kids). I know that it's not the healthiest but I wouldn't put it up there with chicharrones or something.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:total junk food to me.

This is very rigid. As far as snacks go, if an apple is a 1 and a donut or fast food is a 10, I'd put organic chips and fresh pico at maybe a 2 or 3?

LOL. Organic chips. I don't think that's the issue.

You're frying dough. That's why they're unhealthy.
And if you eat flour tortilla based chips, those are fried masa and lard.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:total junk food to me.

This is very rigid. As far as snacks go, if an apple is a 1 and a donut or fast food is a 10, I'd put organic chips and fresh pico at maybe a 2 or 3?

LOL. Organic chips. I don't think that's the issue.

You're frying dough. That's why they're unhealthy.
And if you eat flour tortilla based chips, those are fried masa and lard.

There is a very broad spectrum of chip options. Some are baked, most are fried, (if fried) various oils used, some are pita, salt free (naked), different flours and corns, some are fresh without any preservatives.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:total junk food to me.

This is very rigid. As far as snacks go, if an apple is a 1 and a donut or fast food is a 10, I'd put organic chips and fresh pico at maybe a 2 or 3?

LOL. Organic chips. I don't think that's the issue.

You're frying dough. That's why they're unhealthy.
And if you eat flour tortilla based chips, those are fried masa and lard.

Quick glance at labels, the average store bought tortilla chips are far less problematic than average potato chips.

[Anonymous]

I consider them junk food.

[Anonymous]

What kind of stupid question is this? Of course it is junk food. Chips and salsa are a calorie bomb devoid of nutrients. People who think it is low cal are deluding themselves, because nearly everyone eats way more than 1 serving. The chips alone are salt, fat, oil, and refined food bombs. There are tons of sodium in most salsas. Chips and guac and chips and salsa are fantastic ways to pack on pounds.

[Anonymous]

Truly absurd to call salsa “junk” food. I don’t think of chips as a junk food since they are just ground corn, oil, and salt, but they are fried at high temperatures which makes them highly inflammatory so it’s a once in a while thing for me. When I think of junk food I think of McDonald’s, candy, donuts, etc.

[Anonymous]

Okay I have to say more about salsa. Nobody would put tomatoes, onions, cilantro, peppers, salt, and lime juice in a bowl and call it junk food. Why would throwing that in the food processor put it into the junk food category?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:There's a new WSJ piece detailing a WSJ editor's journey on Mounjaro (similar to Ozempic). He claims as soon as he jumped off it, the first "bad" food he immediately craved was chips & salsa. Bad? That kind of popped off the page to me.

Am I just naive or is chips & salsa (or chips & guac) really not that unhealthy? Or maybe there are wide variances of tortilla chips people consume and there are some super unhealthy tortilla chips? Or jarred salsas full of tons of sodium?

We make fresh or buy the fresh salsa (or guac) at WF and use organic blue tortilla chips. I honestly never considered it a bad snack.

Consider the source! Everything is fine in moderation and there are lot worse things you could eat.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:What kind of stupid question is this? Of course it is junk food. Chips and salsa are a calorie bomb devoid of nutrients. People who think it is low cal are deluding themselves, because nearly everyone eats way more than 1 serving. The chips alone are salt, fat, oil, and refined food bombs. There are tons of sodium in most salsas. Chips and guac and chips and salsa are fantastic ways to pack on pounds.

It’s also a fantastic way to get extremely healthy fats and a serving or two of vegetables. Can you imagine if Americans stopped eating sugars and bread and replaced those with chips and salsa? We would be a much healthier country. I agree with OP that it’s an odd thing to cut out first. Maybe the author has a particular weakness for chips.