Are These 3 Food Derivatives Making You Fat?

When planning a healthy meal, you might be surprised to learn that you should avoid wheat, corn, and soy. It turns out that our bodies weren’t meant to process the large amounts of wheat, soy, and corn that many people ingest on a daily basis. (Updated March 13, 2022)

In his book, In Defence of Food: The Myth of Nutrition and the Pleasures of Eating, author Michael Pollan states that most people take in about 60 percent of their calories from these unhealthy foods, as opposed to the one-to-five percent that we should be aiming for.

Wheat

While it’s a main food ingredient used all over the world, wheat can actually cause health problems. A simple piece of bread contains a number of chemicals and wheat derivatives that can cause a host of problems in people who eat it.

The main problem with wheat is something you’ve likely already heard about: gluten. Many people are actually gluten intolerant and this intolerance can lead to all sorts of problems, including digestive problems, joint pain, and even extra weight gain and inflammation.

Beyond gluten, there’s also concern over other components of wheat that can cause problems when eaten. One example is starch. Thanks to the starches in modified wheat, two slices of whole bread can raise a person’s blood sugar more than two tablespoons of sugar. Basically, eating bread can put you on a path towards diabetes.

Digesting wheat can also produce exorphins, a sort of hunger-based endorphin that increases appetite and makes you hungry for more. Obviously, this is less-than-ideal for the weight-conscious.

Soy

Though marketed as a healthy alternative to many other foods, soy itself might actually be bad for you. Some soy products contain chemicals call phyto-estrogens, which signal your body to store extra fat, leading to weight gain. While soy is often cited as a great food to lower cancer risks, it can cause problems the thyroid, digestive, and reproductive systems in the human body.

The trouble is that many soy products on shelves haven’t been fermented to unlock the beneficial potential. Non-fermented soy products are much less healthy, but have a higher rate of use in processed foods. Soy derivatives are used in all sorts of products despite this though, including in cooking oil, as an emulsifier, and even in muscle-building supplements. Not to mention regular foodstuffs that contain soy products like vitamins, bread, sauces, soups, and more. Soy products are even injected into chicken skin.

In addition to all of these factors, there are many people with soy allergies and the increased use of soy products could lead to catastrophic problems for allergy sufferers. Even if the allergy isn’t life-threatening, there is the possibility of less-dangerous allergies causing problems in people who eat soy products.

Corn

Corn is another massively popular foodstuff and, sadly, it might actually be people’s collective love that has damaged it. Most of the corn grown in the United States is now genetically altered to produce its own pesticide, altering the very vegetable itself at the most basic level. This modified corn could be doing all sorts of unknown damage to your body and to your weight loss plan. Some countries have already banned the importation of American-modified corn, including Russia and Poland.

There’s also high fructose corn syrup, which you’ve likely already heard of in a less-than-flattering light. This gooey corn derivative is present in a variety of foodstuffs and is pretty hard to escape. Studies have also shown that high fructose corn syrup, sometimes called glucose or fructose, can also make you more hungry, causing you to eat more than you should. Other corn derivatives are present in a whole host of food products, including salad dressing, soda pop, candy, ketchup, and more. Corn starch is even present in envelope adhesive.

What Do I Eat Instead?

Some have said that the real trick to weight loss is portion control and calorie-counting, and it is hard to argue with many of the seen results of those styles of dieting. It’s also a sad fact that it’s becoming harder and harder to avoid wheat, corn, and soy derivatives, especially if you are living on a budget. The real trick might be to simply limit the food you eat in your three daily meals and try to make at least half of it some form of non-modified vegetable.