One day recently, my son had two long, back-to-back doctor appointments, which meant he was in the car and in waiting rooms for much of the afternoon. His lunch and snack would not have earned me a healthy-mom award: peanut-butter puffs, a grape-jelly Uncrustables sandwich, and a package of mixed-berry oat bites. All ultra-processed foods, the new boogeyman of public health.

I have many years of experience as a health reporter, and I understand the importance of healthy eating. I’m well aware of the fervent push by both right- and left-leaning health authorities to get Americans to eat fewer ultra-processed foods. The American Academy of Pediatrics recommends that parents limit their kids’ consumption of ultra-processed foods, including “anything in a crinkly bag”—that is, everything my son ate that day. Removing ultra-processed foods from Americans’ diets has also become a central plank of the MAHA movement, led by Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who blames them for “driving the obesity epidemic.” On the podcast from Levels, the glucose-monitoring company co-founded by President Donald Trump’s surgeon-general nominee, Casey Means, one expert suggested that ultra-processed foods should be in a back section of the supermarket, covered in warnings about their dangers. On the internet, crunchy moms of seemingly all political stripes post recipes for homemade goldfish crackers, for example, or hand-sculpted chicken nuggets. TikTok influencers show off the unprocessed steamed cauliflower and carrot salad that they’ve prepared for their toddlers. (Suspiciously missing are images of the toddlers actually eating this food.)

Nevertheless, like many working parents