In a study from the University of Aberdeen, scientists found that ready meals are not only not as nutritious as home-cooked meals, but also have a higher carbon footprint.
Ready meals are very popular, due to the lack of time for cooking and varying mealtimes.
In the study, the team compared nutritional quality, greenhouse gas emissions, and cost of 54 chilled or frozen ready meals, and equivalent home-cooked meals.
They compared animal versus plant-based meals and assessed the effects of various cooking methods on greenhouse gas emissions.
The team found the average level of free sugars (those that are added to food) in ready meals was much higher than in equivalent home-cooked meals.
Ready meals also had much higher greenhouse gas emissions than equivalent home-cooked meals.
The findings suggest that animal-based ready meals have a much higher carbon footprint than equivalent home-cooked meals.
Emissions are nearly 40% higher for animal-based ready meals than equivalent home-cooked meals. Plant-based ready meals and equivalent home-cooked meals had comparable greenhouse gas emissions.
Cooking ready meals or equivalent home-cooked meals adds further emissions.
The team found oven cooking added up to 20% to greenhouse gas emissions, whereas stove and microwave cooking added only up to 4% or less than 1% to greenhouse gas emissions, respectively.
They say the ready meal market has a UK market value of over £3.9 billion. It is estimated that 90% of the UK population eats ready meals, with two out of five eating them once a week.
However, recipes for ready meals vary considerably, thus there is significant scope for the food industry to improve its nutritional quality and reduce its carbon footprint.
If you care about nutrition, please read studies that whole grain foods could help increase longevity, and vitamin D supplements strongly reduce cancer death.
For more information about nutrition, please see recent studies about plant nutrient that could help reduce high blood pressure, and flavonoid-rich foods could improve survival in Parkinson’s disease.
The study was conducted by Magaly Aceves Martins et al and published in Public Health Nutrition.
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