[poink]

Are we pretending that optimizing for taste is a bad thing?

It’s obviously bad to eat super salty “ultraprocessed” food all the time, but it’s not like the salt is the primary problem

To take OP’s example, I’d much rather kids eat generously salted broccoli that is “optimized for taste” rather than unsalted mac & cheese, regardless of whether they just throw it away (which I probably would, too)

[sevg]

> It feels like you’re using “industrial food” as a pejorative, but the best chefs in the world also do not skimp on salt

Your first comment that kicked off this sub-thread missed the context. We’re talking about school food kids eat every day, not occasional restaurant meals. So the appeal to authority of “best chefs in the world” doesn’t make sense here.

My point wasn’t that taste is bad, it’s that when you optimize solely for taste like restaurants do (using high salt, high fat etc without disclosure), you can create health problems when consumed daily.

[margalabargala]

> My point wasn’t that taste is bad, it’s that when you optimize solely for taste like restaurants do (using high salt, high fat etc without disclosure), you can create health problems when consumed daily.

Your implication is that high salt in meals causes these health problems. It does not. You might as well say high vitamin, high nurrient meal.

Don't conflate the effects of eating ultraprocessed foods with the effects of eating salt just because one often contains the other. What you're doing is complaining about the health effects of water, having observed that soda is mostly water.

[scns]

> unsalted mac & cheese

Cheese already contains loads of salt.