The concept of ultra-processed foods invaded the minds of almost all Americans during 2023. We have learned that we can now absolve ourselves of all guilt for dietary indiscretions. It is not our fault! It is Big Food forcing us to eat what we know is bad for us! An avalanche of articles on the net and a very popular book revealed the demon that is causing all our chronic disease problems! It took an infectious disease physician—not a dietitian or a nutritionist or a chronic disease specialist—but a physician outside his area of expertise to solve this vexing health problem.

As we adjust to 2024, my wife, my dog, and I look back at the past year. One of the best things about living in our new location is biking on the Swamp Rabbit Trail almost every day. And the prettiest spot on the trail is the lake on the Furman University campus. On one of our first trips on the trail we spied what appeared to be a black swan on the lake. Black swans are very rare in nature and are symbolic of rare events. Could it be that we were blessed with such a wonderful creature in our life? Sure enough, after googling it we found that Furman really did have a black swan. One day, as we coasted by the lake, we noticed that the swan was gone. Subsequent trips left us deprived—a little saddened and a little resigned to the idea that good things do not last!

But onto an analysis of what went down on the blog this year:

Themes. The overall approach was less focused this past year than previously. A pattern had emerged where a major book was reviewed followed by a discussion centered around a theme from that book in subsequent posts that month. That pattern was disrupted. Some themes emerged early in the year including food philosophy (or why we choose to eat what we do), world hunger, developing healthy eating patterns, holism vs. reductionism, technology and food diversity, as well as ultraprocessing as affected by hyperpalatability. Such themes were more scattershot and less developed than in previous years. Ted Kyle provided some inspiration on the relationship between correlation and causation.  

Milestones. This post represents the 350^th on this site since I first published “A Note on Science” on September 27, 2016, followed by “Defending Processed Food: Are You Kidding Me?” on October 5. On a site where I usually posted every week, there were only 29 previous posts this year.

Best books reviewed in 2023. I ventured out into some reviews of unconventional books, at least to this site. They included

Uncontrolled Spread: What we did Wrong and what we did Right in the fight against COVID

The Philosophy of Food

Development Engineering: Empowering the Poor through Sustainable-based Solutions

Healthy Eating Policy and Political Philosophy: A Public Reason Approach

and Eating to Extinction: The World’s Rarest Foods and Why We Need to Save Them

My desire to expand the horizon of the readers of my blog failed. They were not interested, for the most part, in the direction I was taking the blog. To be fair, my book reviews have never been a major attraction on the site.

The two most consequential books reviewed this year were

Whole: Rethinking the Science of Nutrition

and Ultra-Processed People: The Science Behind the Food that Isn’t Food

Whole encourages us to adopt a whole-foods: plant-based diet to avoid becoming Ultra-Processed People. Both books represent idealistic visions of healthy eating rejected by the modern public. The typical American is not willing to give up ultra-processed products, but such books are effective at inducing guilt about their unhealthy dietary patterns. A vegan diet does not appeal to more than about 5% of the American population.     

My favorite food book this year was a novel!

          Lessons in Chemistry

which provided me the opportunity to write about the wonderful world of food chemistry!

Top 10 Viewed Posts.

10.Why complicate everything? Eating well is so simple: the holistic 3V’ rule

9.The United States of Excess: Gluttony and the Dark Side of American Exceptionalism

8.Bonus Post: Emulsifiers in Ultra-Processed Foods

7.My personal experience with Hello Fresh

6.Food waste from two different perspectives

5.How Big Food hides undesirable chemicals in its clean labels

4.How much does homemade mayo differ from store-bought mayo?

3.Are we eating real food or edible foodlike substances

2.Fast food and its effect on regional cuisines

1.What makes a processed food an ultra-processed food? How dangerous to our health is ultra-processing?

Biggest surprises. As I was moving away from defending ultra-processed products, my readers seemed to be moving more toward a better understanding of them. Top ten posts 1-5, 8, & 10 were aimed at a greater understanding of ultraprocessing, food additives, or formulation. Usually, guest posts appear more abundantly in the Top 10, but only three (4, 8, & 10) were by guest bloggers this year. Only one post (10) was posted this year. All others were from previous years.

The future of the blog in 2024. I am finding it more difficult to post each week and am contemplating in which direction I should take the blog. I am not quite ready to give it up, but I am no longer posting weekly. My bike rides with Betty and Sweetie are cutting into my productive blogging times. My reading is veering away from books on food to a multitude of other topics. I am intrigued, however about a group of books of how we traveled from an apparent idyllic period of healthy eating to modern-day diets. I would like to pare down my posting to one or two a month but to make them more substantive. I am not sure how that will go.

New Years Resolutions. I resolved at the end of 2021 and 2022 to cut back on my responses on LinkedIn with particular references to ultra-processed foods. Yet I have been drawn into the flame like a moth again in 2023. I try to draw the discussion away from simple solutions to a broader perspective, but too often I succumb to defending these products to non-sympathetic audiences. In a sermon last week my preacher urged us not to bring our own weather to the picnic. My LinkedIn forays appeared to be doing just that! I tried reposting a previous post on my site to LinkedIn making the point that socioeconomic factors affect the purchase and consumption of ultra-processed foods. I seemed to have failed at engaging a broader audience. One former student encouraged me to bring out my “chemistry sword” presumably to slay UPF opponents. I am tired of engaging in the old battles. My resolution is to re-evaluate where I am and decide where to take the blog in 2024.

One more thing. Earlier this month we were walking around the lake at Furman. Guess what we saw. Not one black swan, but two! So much for our cynical selves!

Wishing all of my readers a very happy 2024! Don’t let the cynics get you down, and don’t forget to check your weather at the door before you take it to the picnic!