I’m a man of nostalgic lunch experiences: one of the most deeply satisfying joys of my childhood was tearing a round of bologna from its red plastic casing, slathering on a generous smear of mayonnaise, rolling it into a rubbery tube — or a cone. A ritual cameo is the occasional case – and quickly consumes it.
I still feel yearning when I see the festive pink and yellow clock on the refrigerator case; Every corned beef sandwich I eat is perhaps a Freudian attempt to recapture some of that magic.
So when I say lunch is convenient and delicious, it’s close to both my heart and stomach and without complete disrespect.
But even I have to admit that deli meat has baggage. In large and varied studies, regular consumption of processed meat – including cold cuts and hot dogs – leads to higher rates of cancer and cardiovascular disease.
This product is also available High risk for contamination Outbreaks of — including listeria — have made headlines recently, one of which is tainted Boar’s head liverwurst which has sickened 57 people and killed nine since July Prompted a wave of lawsuits. Listeria is a nasty little bug that can cause vomiting, diarrhea and meningitis and can be especially deadly for vulnerable people.
Experts say there is no healthy amount of food to eat. Yet, beyond convenience, pleasure, or pure sentiment, it often remains on the menu. If you’re one of the many people who has a special place in your gut for deli sandwiches, there are still ways to cut their losses.
What That Pastrami Sandwich Is Doing To Your Body
Cold cuts differ from other types of meat in one important way: they are processed in a way that delays spoilage This processing includes various methods, including drying (such as beef jerky), fermentation (such as many salamis and pepperonis), smoking (such as country ham), and curing with salt or other additives (such as many hot dogs and wide range of lunches).
Processing meat adds more to it than just shelf life.
Curing, often using nitrates and nitrites — preservatives that prevent spoilage and preserve the meat’s pink color — and salt, is a common way food manufacturers extend the life of modern cold cuts. When they reach the intestine, nitrates and nitrites can be converted into different molecules, among them Harmful to your health. These compounds are found naturally in some foods, including vegetables, but combining them with animal protein—especially high levels of protein cold ironLike beef and pork — they increase the chance of transformation into those bad actors.
Smoking meat also changes its chemical composition. Cooking animal protein at high temperatures and burning off the dripping juices and fat creates amazing flavors – but also, a whole other set. gnarly compound.
Changing the chemical composition of meat in this way has health consequences for those who eat large amounts of it. In 2015, the World Health Organization published a report that concluded that eating just 50 grams of processed meat per day — roughly the equivalent of one hot dog — increased a person’s lifetime risk of colorectal cancer by 18 percent. Other studies also suggest an increase in processed meat consumption Breast, prostate, esophagusAnd the pancreas Cancer risk.
Eating processed meats can increase the risk of cardiovascular disease, including heart attack and stroke, in part because of their high salt content — which raises blood pressure — and their high levels of saturated fat. In a large European study, one led by a daily hot dog 30 percent increase Rates of cardiovascular disease.
It’s not just the deli meat in a deli sandwich that can affect your health, he says Julia JumpanoA registered dietitian at the Cleveland Clinic Center for Human Nutrition. Supporting players, including bread, spices, cheese and other goodies, are also part of the nutritional picture, so they also bear some consideration, for better or worse.
Why is lunch meat particularly prone to contamination?
The long and winding path of deli meat from production facility to table also creates multiple opportunities for microbial contamination. Cuts of meat are often processed and mixed together into a slab in one place, cut in another, then “moved from a conveyor belt to a packaging center, to a cooler, to a semi, to a distribution center, to another semi. Grocery store, and then nobody buys it.” It just sits there,” Zumpano said.
A recent liverwurst outbreak involved Listeria, a bacteria Especially dangerous For neonates and pregnant, immunocompromised or people 65 years and older. But also linked to lunch Salmonella And Campylobacter Contamination sometimes occurs Dirty manufacturing plant — eg The latest pig head outbreak — but it can also happen when contaminated meat spreads bacteria to other products through contact with knives or meat slicers Deli counter.
A loss-reduction method for sandwiches
Zumpano says — much to the chagrin of my fellow bologna lovers — that the healthiest lunch is no lunch at all. Still, you might want to consider what the alternative is when packing your lunch. If you replace the hoagie with fast food or something from a vending machine, she says, “maybe that deli meat sandwich could be a little healthier—depending on the deli meat.” (It’s worth noting that even Zumpano says he eats deli meat from time to time.)
If you’re not ready to take a break from cold cuts, there’s still a lot you can do to reduce the health risks of your sandwich.
Buying cold cuts at a deli counter is a great first step. This is where you can find preservative-free meats that won’t last long on supermarket shelves. If you have access to fresh-cut meat on sale, “you can probably get a turkey breast that’s just shredded turkey” — nitrate- and nitrite-free, unsmoked and without tons of added salt, he says. illusionA registered dietitian nutritionist based in Brooklyn. (The fatty, preservative-filled stuff can also be found at deli counters, so you still need to make your decisions critically here.)
Zumpano says — much to the chagrin of my fellow bologna lovers — that a healthy lunch is no lunch at all.
Making this choice comes with a small benefit sacrifice: Because preservative-free meat has a shorter shelf life, you need to buy it less often. “When I buy meat fresh off the bone, I buy half a pound versus a pound,” Zumpano says.
If you’re nowhere near a deli counter or you’re not ready to give up packaged cold cuts, you still have plenty of choices. Don’t bother looking at the front of the package — it’s all marketing, Zumpano says — and instead, flip it over to see more detailed information on the back.
Feller starts by looking at the ingredients list. The meat you expect to eat should be the first ingredient on the list, not water or other ingredients that act as fillers or binders, she says. He recommends looking at the daily recommended allowance of sugar, saturated fat and salt in a serving of produce; All of these should come close to or below 5 percent.
The back of the package should also tell you if the product contains nitrates or nitrites. Here, don’t assume that natural is necessarily better: some manufacturers add celery or beetroot powder to their products to benefit them. Naturally high levels of nitratesBut there is no evidence that meat cured with these products is less harmful. Natural or not, these chemicals can do the same damage as synthetic nitrates, says Christian Jimenez Martinezis a biochemist at Mexico’s National Polytechnic Institute who wrote a recent review on nature conservation. “The dose makes the poison,” he wrote in an email to Vox.
The same goes for high-end artisanal products, which are not necessarily good for us. There’s a strange egalitarianism to knowing that both small-batch charcuterie and mass-produced baloney can achieve the same level of carcinogenicity, which makes it especially important for consumers to understand what they’re eating.
Although public health authorities generally recommend that pregnant and immune-compromised individuals avoid cold cuts, especially to avoid the risk of Listeria infection, people can safely consume these products. heating them up First, some health experts recommend zapping a damp paper towel in the microwave until steaming; Jumpano pan-fried lunch when she was pregnant.
If you’re ready for a radical change, you can give your sandwiches a complete makeover. An alternative is to thinly slice leftover meat or other protein you’ve cooked at home. (Zumpano often suggests that her clients cook twice the amount of protein they plan to eat at dinner, then put the rest in a sandwich or on top of a salad the next day.) For a convenient shelf-stable option that’s protein-rich but less processed, go to lunch. Low-sodium canned chicken and fish are better bets.
Life is full of opportunities to trade a little risk for a little joy, and sandwiches offer a daily opportunity to make that trade.
You can make your ham sandwich healthier by switching to a lunch cart. Replacing heavily processed bread with bread that contains water, flour, yeast, salt and some added grains or seeds can increase the nutritional value of a sandwich. So can switch out the mayo for hummus or avocado spread, which usually contain healthy fats and some soluble fiber. It’s always good to ramp up the vegetable content by adding more tomatoes, bell peppers, cucumbers, and other garden favorites.
Life is full of opportunities to trade a little risk for a little joy, and sandwiches offer a daily opportunity to make that trade. For long-term health, the key is to choose the low-risk option more often and save the high-risk option for moments of celebration.
