& # 039; Realfooders & # 039 ;: where does this new fashing fashion come from?

Surely you've heard it from a friend while you have dinner: "I am 'realfooder', I've been eating only healthy food for months. " Sundays or the one I prepared your grandmother With all her love when you visited her in town. We are back to the old regime, paradoxical that sounds?

Something like that. English terms aside, which always sound better, it is true that the 'Realfooding' movement It seems to have come to stay. The culprit of this initiative is the nutritionist Carlos Ríos, with more than 1.2 million followers on Instagram, and what seemed like a fad a few months ago aims to become a lifestyle. It is very simple, the battle is fought against the ultraprocessed, which after all are the main culprits of overweight and many diseases such as diabetes or some types of cancer.

An obsession

It seems easy, doesn't it? We all know that processed foods are bad for your health. However, sometimes it is difficult to find market options that do not have refined raw materials or additives. Justly, the 'realfooding' movement advocates to identify them to avoid them, and Ríos not only takes care of upload to social networks healthy menus and options, also fights brands demonstrating that not everything is as good as it seems.

As it does? Today it is much simpler because in recent times there have been applications that, probably, you have already heard about. 'MyRealFood' or 'Yuka' They scan the food for you to think twice before buying it. The French 'Yuka', for example, classify food (or cosmetics) on a scale of 1 (mediocre) to 100 (excellent), depending on your presence of additives, nutritional quality or ecological dimension. 'MyRealFood', in addition to studying whether the product is good or not depending on the processed ingredients it carries, it also has a food finder to know if what you are going to ingest is real, processed or ultraprocessed.

The 'realfooding' advocates taking natural foods and fighting the ultraprocessed. Thanks to applications that scan food it's easier

And as the obsession could not stay at home, many restaurants are also moving to the latest trend. With a quick internet search, in your area you will discover that thousands of chains have signed up to that paradox that is the fact that you want eat "at home" But out of it. "Fresh and seasonal ingredients", "organic and healthy food", which is also perfect in the photos of Instagram. One cannot avoid, of course, asking certain questions: Is the legend true that the freshest fish goes to Madrid? What is the mango season? Can it be considered a plate of pakoras homemade food?

Where does this come from obsession for healthy? The truth is that it is normal, when we are being continuously bombarded by news that tells us about how bad we eat, how insane we are and how Spain has become a fat country: we are the second country in Europe with more cases of obesity and currently 25% of the Spanish population suffers from overweight problems. In such an environment it is normal to worry about what you put in your mouth.

Orthorexia

However, as with all obsessions, concern about healthy food can also lead to a problem. Orthorexia it is a disorder that was defined in 2000 by Steven Bratman and that, as the name implies (in Greek it would be something like 'right appetite'), it consists of the obsession with healthy food. A pathology that can lead the sufferer to isolate themselves and do less and less things, moving away from normal activities. It may seem silly, but in the most serious cases it can even lead to job loss, depression or suicide.

It is a disorder based on the obsession with healthy foods, which in the most serious cases can lead to isolation or depression

Eating healthy is a maxim that we should all follow, as well as looking for the most appropriate products in order to feel healthy and prevent diseases related to bad nutrition. However, some positions if taken to the extreme can be tremendously harmful to health, so do not obsess with the photos of healthy food on Instagram or with scanning the food. After all, as we said at the beginning, 'realfooders' have not invented anything new: it is simply a matter of looking for what benefits you most Body and your mind.