I will eat turkey sausage occasionally and Canadian bacon. Both on the “less terrible” side of processed meats, but still terrible for you if you eat too much of them.

Got to live a little - just try to find something you can enjoy now and again.

I type this rolling my eyes, as anyone who has had pork sausage or pork bacon knows that the turkey versions are not the same taste; just turkey is less bad for you.

Anonymous wrote:Lunch meat is disgusting. It's barely "meat" and packed full of preservatives and chemicals.

Someone hasn't been the deli counter in a while...

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Lunch meat is disgusting. It's barely "meat" and packed full of preservatives and chemicals.

But what if it's organic, without artificial preservatives?

It's still highly processed. No one knows why yet, but there seems to be something about mass producing food and artificially altering that increases your risks for all sorts of disease. Just the act of highly processing food on a commercial scale seems to be causing issues. Don't forget, nearly all of those deli meats come wrapped in all sorts of plastic after manufacture, so who knows if plastics are leaching into it. Even organic deli meats are shipped in plastics.

It's highly processed. It contains preservatives no matter what brands you probably buy....there is a preservative. It's also huge amounts of sodium. Nearly ALL processed deli meats are a no go if you care about your health at all. Data piles up by the day showing how consumption of ultra processed foods is linked to all sorts of disease. Consumption of processed meats is one of the worst offenders, because it has been correlated with increased risk for pancreatic cancer, which is one of the worst cancers you can possibly get.

Just say no to UPFs. Try to avoid foods that come in a package as much as you can.

Sodium and chemicals. Or food contaminated eg the recent listeria.
We get in store roasted low sodium turkey breast sliced in store at WF. Not Applegate!
But now we nuke it in case of listeria

So if I eat my turkey sandwich with extra cheese I’m good?!

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The curing process and the nitrates are bad for you. Somehow it has a carcinogenic effect.

Even the organic/nitrate free are bad because it is still cured, but the nitrites are “naturally occurring” with celery salt or some other natural curing agent vs added nitrates, but it still has nitrates.

This poster is correct.

https://www.hsph.harvard.edu/news/hsph-in-the-news/processed-meats-caution/

That’s a pretty high level summary and is so consistent with American health guidance where it’s easier just to give people a bright line rule than explain shades of grey.
There’s a lot of debate about whether level of risk of meats cured without nitrates and the studies that have been done don’t control well for this question. It’s clearly not as bad as nitrates and probably not as good as eating a freshly killed chicken. But the rest is unclear.

Here’s a report showing that meats cured with nitrates are worse and noting previous studies didn’t differentiate well:
https://www.theguardian.com/society/2022/dec/27/too-much-nitrite-cured-meat-brings-clear-risk-of-cancer-say-scientists

I also fiohnd some online health stuff indicating that consuming calcium at the same time blocks your body from absorbing the nitrates, which I thought was interesting! (Calcium blocks absorption of iron, so I guess not that surprising it might also block absorption of nitrate.).

Anonymous wrote:It depends upon which lunch meat you are talking about. Just plain roast turkey? Roast beef? Mortadella/bologna? Salami?

Read the label. Find nitrate/nitrite free plain meat.

cold cuts that claim to be “nitrate free” often just have naturally occurring nitrates (often celery juice).

sodium

It depends upon which lunch meat you are talking about. Just plain roast turkey? Roast beef? Mortadella/bologna? Salami?

Read the label. Find nitrate/nitrite free plain meat.

Anonymous wrote:The curing process and the nitrates are bad for you. Somehow it has a carcinogenic effect.

Even the organic/nitrate free are bad because it is still cured, but the nitrites are “naturally occurring” with celery salt or some other natural curing agent vs added nitrates, but it still has nitrates.

This poster is correct.

https://www.hsph.harvard.edu/news/hsph-in-the-news/processed-meats-caution/