Part of the overwhelming allure of processed foods beyond the colorful, creative packaging shouting at you from the shelf is the orderly, symmetrical and very consistent shapes of each cracker, chip, cookie, puff and flake.
The freakish uniformity of each Oreo cookie to all others that ever existed lulls the consumer into a complacent and dazed shopping routine that requires neither thought nor examination to execute.
Contrast the mindless grab and go mentality of supermarket shopping with the thoughtful and slow progression of a consumer through a farmer’s market as vegetables, fruits, and artisanal foods are picked up, touched and examined closely to determine which are ripest, most nutritious, and of highest quality.
When processed foods like pop tarts are examined under a scanning electron microscope (SEM), however, this uniformity fades away and a very different picture emerges.
Misshapen chaos and a horrifying lack of uniform chemical structure is revealed at 30,000 times the actual size.
In fact, artist/photographer Caren Alpert declares that pop tarts at electron microscope magnification strikingly resembles a pink calcium deposit.
Yuck!
Contrast the scary disharmony of a pop tart’s magnified chemical structure with the precision and conformity of a pineapple leaf. Â Do all pineapple leaves look the same? Â Definitely not. Â But under an electron microscope, the true beauty and order is revealed.
How about a fortune cookie? Â Does this look like something our digestive system would welcome and know exactly what to do with?
Compare this chemical chaos with that of a simple almond below. Â Doesn’t it seem that the orderly perfection of our digestive enzymes would work a lot more effectively with this precise molecular structure?
The next time you are tempted to pick up that colorful package from the store shelf, remember that the comforting uniformity you see with your naked eye is a complete illusion. The true molecular nature of that enticing processed food is one of chaos and disharmony that will correspondingly bring decay and decline to the person that eats it.
It is ironically the visual irregularity of whole foods that is the clue to their true nature of orderly symmetry under intense magnification.
If these pictures astound you as they did me, you can view the entire collection of Ms. Alpert’s amazing photo series online here, or at New York’s Citigroup Building (153 E. 53rd St.) through January 31, 2013.
Sarah, The Healthy Home Economist
When I saw the picture of the pop-tart, I was thinking that’s gross but I wonder what an unprocessed food looked like and then you showed pictures of a pineapple leaf and almond. Wow. Mother nature is perfect.
Microscopic, yes, but it’s not the chemical structure of these foods we’re looking at in these photos. I think most everything you say Sarah makes a great deal of sense but I don’t know that these photos are necessarily telling you what you want them to be telling you …
Agreed with Allison, here… If you took any food and put it in a blender, or even chewed it, or mixed it with something else, it would no longer look like this. The raisin looks pretty icky and it’s one substance. The vitamin C looks pretty creepy, too. The Oreo actually kind of looks pretty. The point I’m trying to make is, I think that almond blended with raw cream and maple syrup would probably look equally weird. The substances that look weird are combinations of things, for the most part, natural or not. And, as Allison said, this is just the physical appearance of the outside of a slice or piece of something. Smash it and it won’t look so pretty, but will that make it unwholesome?
I don’t personally eat Pop-tarts, and I get my food locally and from farmers I know, but I think using this as an argument makes our side look like they missed the boat.
That should have read “Alison,” not “Allison.” Sorry 🙂
Scary! Have you found a healthy version that you like?
Did anyone else see the photo of the Shrimp Tale? Those have got to be FEATHERS! Weird!
Drat. I got really excited because I thought this was going to be a recipe for an HHE-approved Pop-Tart! 😉
But, these images are fascinating. Glad you shared them, Sarah.
Me, too! Double drat. As a closet ex-pop-tart eater (shhhh! don’t tell anyone), I think this calls for some sort of recipe contest to create a lusciously lovely, splendidly symmetrical, tantalizingly traditional, modern makeover of a pop-tart!
Is anyone up for the challenge? I bet someone could be a featured post here if you came up with a good lard, sprouted flour, whole fruit, honey, maple redux creation! The frosting could even be optional.
I have always known that God is orderly. Now the microscope shows us proof. Even the food he has made for us has order.
Boy am I glad I didn’t even know what a poptart was until I saw the picture. Never had one in my life and glad for it! Lol
You caught me by the title. I thought you had found some pop tarts that you approved of and was horrified. 🙂 I am glad to have read the article. I am going to show it to my kids. TFS.
Those pics are fascinating. You can see the beauty of real food and the ugliness of the fake.
eww