Everyone Says Bars Are Processed. How Are Yours Better Than Others?

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Everyone says Bars are Processed how are yours better than others? This is JJ Virgin, four time New York Times bestselling author, celebrity nutrition expert and Fitness hall of Famer. I've been on a lifelong quest for answers to the toughest health questions, and now I'm sharing what I found with you. Welcome to Ask the Health Expert. Starbolt from Facebook asks Everyone says bars are processed. How are yours better than others? This is like a really, really great question. I just didn't think about this for a minute and I have the answer, so stay with me.

Hey jj Virgin here.

Okay, real talk. So often the holidays sneak up on me. Travel, gifts, hosting, you know, all the things and suddenly it's like, wait, who.

Spent what and where?

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So I love the statement Natalie Jill. I got it from Natalie Jill, my pal, and she talks about unprocessing your diet. And overall, I always think, you know, you're always better off eating closer to nature, right? Unprocessing your diet. But we also live in the real world and we've got to balance eating as close to nature as possible, eating as whole foods as possible with convenience. And the fact that we are out and about. Well, maybe not so much at the time I'm recording this. Haven't left the house for weeks on end, but for the most part we're out and about. And it can be a little challenging to like bring a salad in your purse. Right? So I like to think of when we are having processed foods, clean processed and dirty processed. How about that? So here would be something that I would consider dirty processed. That would be something that contains damaged fats like, and these are fats like hydrogenated oils, cheap or corn oil. Right. Cheap vegetable fat, soybean oil, or hydrogenated. That means chemically processed oils. So number one, those two, like cheap fillers, and then three, of course, you knew I was gonna say this. Sugars, excess sugars and anything. Five grams. Sort of my limit in a food item. Of course, it depends if it, if the product only had, you know, 25 calories and 5 grams, that's a lot. So I look for, for little or preferably no added sugar and definitely no artificial sweeteners. Also no artificial colorings and those things that you cannot pronounce. Right. And also intolerant proteins. So possibly the use of milk solids, soy protein. Now soy lecithin. I don't have an issue with soy protein. Another whole other deal, wheat. So some of the more intolerant proteins. And so then what would fall in here? Well, chips and, you know, chips and cookies and dress things. There's a lot of things out there that as you start to flip them over and look at labels, you'll go, yep, that's a dirty processed food. Well, what about clean processed foods? Because I do use a bunch of processed foods and what I want to think of as minimally processed and clean processed. So, you know, if you look at it. Hey, the supplements we're taking, they're processed, right? But you want to make sure, just like with anything else, like I'm making sure I have clean processed supplements. I'm not taking a supplement that has folic acid instead of folate. You never want to touch that. I'm not eating, taking a supplement that uses DL alpha tocopherol. Right. So I'm super careful about the supplements that I take and what is in them. And same with like fish oil, you want to make sure that you've got minimally processed fish oil that's been cold processed and checked for any kinds of impurities. Same with oils in general. You want to look at oils that are cold processed, that are first press, you know, organic. So those are the things I can think of right off the bat that I do. But also like sparkling water with a little bit of fruit essence from my girlfriend Kara golden over at Hint. Well, that's processed but minimally. And then my shakes, I have both plant based and bone broth protein based shakes. Well, those are minimally processed as well. And such an easy, convenient way for me to break my fast mid morning while I'm intermittent fasting and get in a ton of nutrition when I'm on the run. I always carry my bars with me because I know that they're clean processed, they don't have any crappy ingredients like I already mentioned. And it's a great way for me to get fiber, protein and healthy fats and have a mini meal if I'm going to be stuck out for a while, not end up eating something that I shouldn't. And then sweeteners, if you look at like, you know, stevia leaf or allulose or erythritol or monk fruit, all of these things have been processed as well. And then look at something like a coffee bean and what they have to do with roasting the coffee bean and then making sure that it doesn't have mold. So I think the important distinction here is to look at dirty processed versus clean processed and then look at those ingredients and see and then you will know exactly how to make those right choices out there. And there's some great bars and shakes out there and then there's some ones that have been dirty processed. And just like some of this other stuff, like you know, chips and fruit leathers and some of the other stuff, there are things that you wouldn't want to put into your body. This is JJ with Ask the Health Expert Effort. I do this five times a week, so make sure you never miss a show by going to subscribetojay.com.

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