Are there healthy potato chips?

[kylefoley76]

It's really hard to maintain a healthy diet if you deny yourself the so-called 'fun' foods forever. I don't want to use the word 'junk food' because to me that implies 'unhealthy'. So I'm going to call a 'fun' food a food which is extremely delicious. For me this would include: pretzels, soda, potato chips, popcorn, cake, pizza, chocolate and candy bars. We can have a separate thread on pizza, chocolate, cake, and pretzels. So for now I want to focus on soda and potato chips. I've found the soda Zevia

https://www.target.com/p/zevia-diet...cfHo7fEWVGKXRvZrkJBoCL5QQAvD_BwE&gclsrc=aw.ds

Which to me is about 90% as yummy by itself as Sprite but when tasted mixed with other food is 100% as yummy. It appears to be healthy since Michael Greger gives the green flag for stevia sweetener. It's other ingredients are:

CARBONATED WATER, STEVIA LEAF EXTRACT, TARTARIC ACID, NATURAL FLAVORS, CAFFEINE, CITRIC ACID

Citric Acid appears ok though I'm not that certain since I only looked at one website which isn't very rigorous and I do not have any idea how reliable this website is. (I only have so much time that I can devote towards researching facts)

https://www.livestrong.com/article/474973-is-citric-acid-bad-for-you/

Since I have limited time I'm going to skip over the other ingredients for now. This brings us to potato chips. First, just about every bag of potato chips I've seen has a high number of sodium. I've seen this range from 7.8 to 2.8 grams of sodium per gram of food. I'm having a little trouble finding the product online but this brand:

https://express.google.com/u/0/prod...Pbiis-qo6ueARiQ58gBIgNVU0Q&utm_campaign=10046

I've seen a product which has 80 grams of sodium per 28 grams of food which comes to 642 grams of sodium per 100 g and 500 g of calories per 100 g. Those are rather terrible numbers. Most fruits and vegetables have about 50 calories and less than 100 g of sodium per 100 g of food.

Now as far as the ingredients potato chips really aren't highly processed. Basically potatoes and oil, that's it. I realize there is some controversy regarding oil. I try not to eat it because it has the highest caloric density of any food I know of, being pure fat and fat has 9 calories per gram whereas protein and carbs have 4. So I think it's impossible for any food to have a higher caloric density than oil, coming in at 884 calories per 100 grams. Vegan Mic has a video coming out against oil

but I don't know if I trust that guy since he tends to move quickly through the evidence. Again, I don't have the time to sit down and devote hours and hours to researching the reliability of nutritional studies.

In any case, if you're going to eat oil, I figure that it might as well be oil with a low omega 6/omega 3 ratio. This paper, for example, touts the benefits of that ratio:

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/12442909

Flaxseed oil, more precisely,

Oil, flaxseed, contains added sliced flaxseed

seems to have the best ratio coming in at .32 to 1, according to

https://cronometer.com/#foods

(Most Americans have a ratio of 20 to 1). Vegetable oil which is the oil that the above potato chips use has a ratio of 4.41 to 1. The only other oil I've seen for potato chips is coconut oil which has a ratio of 80 to 1 so that is definitely out.

So if there is no such thing as a healthy potato chip, then we might as well try Kale chips. I'm very skeptical that these things taste good but I have to try. I've found this

https://rhythmsuperfoods.com/honey-mustard/

It has 642 g of sodium and 535 calories per 100 g of food. Not very good numbers but what can you do? The ingredients are

kale, sunflower seeds, tahini (ground sesame seeds), cane sugar, onion, apple cider vinegar, carrot, honey, mustard powder, garlic, *sea salt, lemon juice, turmeric, black pepper. *represents a natural non-organic ingredient

Of those, only cane sugar raises a red flag for me at least. Let me know if you have any recommendations for healthy chips.

 

[Lou]

The best you can do is to look at the nutritional info on the bag. Choose the chips with the least fat and sodium. Trader Joe's has a reduced fat chip that is 120 calories, with only 6 grams of fat, and 95 mg of salt. Regular chips are like 150 calories and 9 grams of fat.

I got some multigrain Pita chips the other day. They are 120 calories, 3 grams of fat, and 140 mg of sodium. They might have been the "healthiest" chips I looked at.

I thought maybe sesame sticks would be healthier. but they are just as bad as potato chips.

Anyway, chips are never going to be healthy. but some are a little less bad for you.

 

[Nekodaiden]

It's really hard to maintain a healthy diet if you deny yourself the so-called 'fun' foods forever. I don't want to use the word 'junk food' because to me that implies 'unhealthy'. So I'm going to call a 'fun' food a food which is extremely delicious. For me this would include: pretzels, soda, potato chips, popcorn, cake, pizza, chocolate and candy bars. We can have a separate thread on pizza, chocolate, cake, and pretzels.

Pretzels, soda, potato chips, candy bars: Junk. Highly processed, with added oils, sugar and nearly nutrientless flours.

Popcorn is a whole food. Cake, pizza and chocolate can all be made with whole food plant based ingredients.

Now as far as the ingredients potato chips really aren't highly processed. Basically potatoes and oil, that's it. I realize there is some controversy regarding oil. I try not to eat it because it has the highest caloric density of any food I know of, being pure fat and fat has 9 calories per gram whereas protein and carbs have 4. So I think it's impossible for any food to have a higher caloric density than oil, coming in at 884 calories per 100 grams. Vegan Mic has a video coming out against oil

but I don't know if I trust that guy since he tends to move quickly through the evidence. Again, I don't have the time to sit down and devote hours and hours to researching the reliability of nutritional studies.

Oil is a garbage food just like refined sugar is a garbage food, except the oil has 9 calories per gram where sugar has only 4. They are both without the B vitamins and minerals needed to turn them into energy - which means they are nutrient thieves that use up your body's stores.

You don't have to trust Mic. Just look up the studies for yourself if you want to. They are quickly gone through to make the case he makes, otherwise the video would be too long.

So if there is no such thing as a healthy potato chip, then we might as well try Kale chips. I'm very skeptical that these things taste good but I have to try. I've found this

https://rhythmsuperfoods.com/honey-mustard/

It has 642 g of sodium and 535 calories per 100 g of food. Not very good numbers but what can you do? The ingredients are

kale, sunflower seeds, tahini (ground sesame seeds), cane sugar, onion, apple cider vinegar, carrot, honey, mustard powder, garlic, *sea salt, lemon juice, turmeric, black pepper. *represents a natural non-organic ingredient

Of those, only cane sugar raises a red flag for me at least. Let me know if you have any recommendations for healthy chips.

Honey is not vegan.
Refined Sugar is vegan but it is not healthy for the aforementioned reasons. No B vitamins, no minerals, no fiber. Oil also has no B vitamins, no minerals and no fiber. Tell me why you are sure refined sugar at 4 calories per gram is unhealthy but aren't sure about oil at 9 calories per gram.

 

[kylefoley76]

Oil is a garbage food just like refined sugar is a garbage food, except the oil has 9 calories per gram where sugar has only 4. They are both without the B vitamins and minerals needed to turn them into energy - which means they are nutrient thieves that use up your body's stores.

You don't have to trust Mic. Just look up the studies for yourself if you want to. They are quickly gone through to make the case he makes, otherwise the video would be too long.

You're right. Thanks for pointing that out to me.