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"This is a no-brainer. Junk food has calories, but little or no nutritional value," says pikawicca. "I think we all know it when we see it. Some examples are ice cream, potato chips, pork rinds, you get the idea." It seems obvious at first: Soda and candy bars are junk food, fresh spinach and mangoes are not. But what does it really mean to be junk food? Is it merely unhealthy?
"Take candy bars for example," says ipsedixit. "You might say a Snickers bar is junk, but what about a Snickers Dark, which is made out of dark chocolate? Dark chocolate is supposed to have antioxidant and other healthful benefits. And, aren't peanuts good for you, which all Snickers bars have? Junk?"
Are rice cakes junk food? "They certainly aren't harmful in the sense that they are full of transfats or high in sodium or sugar, but then they are essentially empty calories—offering only simple carbs and very little fiber. Junk?" wonders ipsedixit. "If cardboard had calories, we would just call them rice cakes and make the dictionary one word less voluminous."
For that matter, "is vodka or tequila a 'junk' beverage because its nutrients are minimal?" wonders beevod.
LauraGrace thinks the concept of "junk food" has more to do with the level of factory processing than unhealthiness. A lightly processed food could even be relatively unhealthy—high in fat, say, like heavy cream—and she wouldn't call it junk food. Highly-processed foods, like the aforementioned Snickers bar, would almost always get classified as junk food in LauraGrace's book, though. "Even something low fat, or low carb, or whatever, that bears no resemblance to any ingredient found in nature (fat-free Twinkies, light beer *wink*), I would label as 'junk' in almost every situation," she says. Her definition? "Junk food is anything that, through extensive processing, becomes a product whose component ingredients are unidentifiable."
Discuss: What counts as "junk food"?
A thought-provoking and highly subjective question, so absolute definitions may not apply. First of all, the term ‘junk food’ is oxymoronic. Why not just be direct and call it ‘junk’?
Second, Michael Pollan – best-selling food author, journalist, professor and food activist -- says we should avoid any processed food product containing more than five ingredients, or anything that a...+READ
A thought-provoking and highly subjective question, so absolute definitions may not apply. First of all, the term ‘junk food’ is oxymoronic. Why not just be direct and call it ‘junk’?
Second, Michael Pollan – best-selling food author, journalist, professor and food activist -- says we should avoid any processed food product containing more than five ingredients, or anything that a five-year-old cannot pronounce. I suggest this become the litmus test for junk and a good rule of thumb when deciding what to eat. More specifically:
Tuna fish is not junk, even canned tuna. Adding 400 mg of salt to a 5-oz can of tuna is just one way that Big Food turns food into junk.
Snickers is junk. A bar of 70% dark chocolate made of chocolate, sugar, cocoa butter and vanilla bean is not.
Peanuts are not junk, especially unsalted or low-salt. A whole can of peanuts, with a criminal amounts of salt, is junk.
Rice cakes that contain rice and a little salt are not junk. Rice cakes with sugar, high-fructose corn syrup and assorted chemicals and artificial flavorings are junk.
Shredded Wheat and Grape-Nuts are not junk. Frosted Mini Wheat and Cocoa Puffs -- and any food product with sugar listed as the first or second ingredient -- is junk.
Oatmeal is not junk. A package of instant oatmeal, with its unpronounceable substances and synthetic nutrients, while not the worst food you can eat, is another instance of Big Food mucking things up, transforming real food into junk.
Plain yogurt is not junk. Yogurt with jam would be okay if not for the added gelatin, hfcs and sugar which plops it firmly in the junk column. Even Activia plain yogurt, with 17 grams of sugar and added preservatives, is junk. Yogurt doesn't need preservatives.
A pina colada, made with rum, coconut cream & pineapple, while it may get you drunk, it is not junk. A pina colada-flavored powdered mix, whether it is added to alcohol or yogurt, is junk.
A loaf of whole grain bread from the corner bakery is not junk. So-called ‘enriched’ bread made from refined flour and engineered ‘nutrients’ is junk.-COLLAPSE