Won’t the Processed Meat on My Charcuterie Board Give me Cancer?

Last week we talked about my three favorite dishes to bring to social holiday events and gatherings.  Two of the dishes contained processed meats, so I wanted to do a follow-up session on the only question I get asked after bringing my beautiful platter of processed meats.  “Hannah, don’t processed meats cause cancer?”

This is a very important question if you’ve been trying to be healthy since 2015.

I want to tackle this issue in Question and Answer style as if we were talking with one another in my kitchen, building our charcuterie board together for our women's group holiday gift exchange. Because the science around this issue is technical and interesting, what we really care about is our day-to-day eating habits in real life.

So close your eyes and pretend we are in my kitchen, just you and me and I’ve invited you over to help set up the board. You’ve brought all the cheese, I have all the meats and ask you to grab the processed meats from the meat drawer in the refrigerator.

You are surprised to hear me call them processed meats…

Q: What is processed meat exactly?

A: Processed meat is any meat like pork, beef, turkey, chicken, or lamb that has been preserved so it doesn’t become infested with bacteria and rot as fast as raw meat.  Historically, we have been preserving and processing meat by smoking or salting and curing it for thousands of years.  In the last one hundred years or so, we’ve started using chemical preservatives too.

This includes meats like ham, sandwich meat, bacon, sausage, salami, pepperoni, smoked salmon, beef jerky, and even hot dogs!  Everything from the sliced turkey in your sandwich to pepperoni on your pizza to a Slim Jim.  We are going to eat salami for lunch and that is processed meat.

Q: But isn’t processed meat bad for us?

A: No, not always. However, it’s a highly contentious debate right now. 

Q: Why do all the magazines and the internet tell me that processed meat causes cancer?

A: Because in 2015, the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC), which is the specialized cancer agency of the World Health Organization, classified processed meats as “carcinogenic” and red meat as “probably carcinogenic” in humans.

This is like congress saying something and it becoming law. But it doesn’t make it infallible. Since then, many scientists and nutritionists have criticized the IARC decision. The science they used to support this claim is very weak and the actual risk is really, really small. So it was a big leap to make from a scientific point of view.  

Sound familiar? It should. That’s what we did with saturated fat and heart disease 40 years ago and we were wrong.

Q: Wow, I didn’t know they could do that, make these big decisions without good evidence.  What is in meat that they think causes cancer?

A:  The thing that everyone is afraid of is called nitrosamine. Nitrosamines are chemical byproducts that are formed from nitrates and nitrites that are found naturally or added to food.  Over time, high exposure to nitrosamines is thought to cause cancer. We use nitrates and nitrites to preserve our food.  Pretty much all processed meat contains nitrates and nitrites, whether directly or indirectly. 

Q: So nitrites and nitrates are bad for us?

A: No, not always.  They are actually very natural and found all around us.  They are naturally in our saliva, our gut, and our circulatory system.

In fact, most Americans get 85% of the nitrates and 30% of the nitrites they eat from fresh fruit and vegetables! Only 6% of our nitrate exposure comes from meat.  Vegetables are particularly rich in nitrates. They include green leafy vegetables such as spinach and lettuce as well as fennel, rocket, radishes, Chinese cabbage, parsley, and beets.  They actually use nitrates found in beets to help improve athletic performance and naturally lower high blood pressure. 

Q: What? If nitrates and nitrites are found in vegetables, why are those foods associated with less cancer?

A: Because they are full of antioxidants like Vitamin C and Vitamin E that help keep the nitrates and nitrites from becoming nitrosamines. 

We know about this process pretty well and in recent years, new curing processes include adding vitamin C, usually as ascorbic acid, to inhibit the creation of nitrosamines in our hot dogs and bacon.  You can also eat foods high in vitamin C with your salami with the same effect. Like red bell peppers and basically any other fruit or vegetable. Even potatoes have Vit C in them!

Remember, the salami doesn’t contain nitrosamines. It includes the ingredients needed to create a nitrosamine.  So, not every piece of pepperoni turns into harmful nitrosamines in our stomachs and colons. Only under certain circumstances.

Q: Like what?

A: Like high-heat cooking.  For instance, we know that if you cook your bacon in the microwave, you create fewer nitrosamines and another concerning compound called heterocyclic amines than if you cook it in a pan.  If you cook your sausages, low-and-slow in a pan of water, instead of hot-and-fast on a grill, you again would create fewer nitrosamines.

Q: What about products labeled “organic” or “uncured” or “no nitrites” are those better?

A: No, not really. Products labeled uncured or organic use celery salt or celery juice because it is a natural source of nitrates and nitrites. So it’s the same thing.  But they are treated differently in the eyes of food laws.

While processed meat manufacturers now have to limit the amount of synthetic nitrates/nitrites in their products and add vitamin C, (remember how that helps us?).  Organic or uncured or no-nitrites products that get their nitrites and nitrates from celery juice, don’t. They may contain more nitrates than conventionally processed meat, which could ultimately increase the risk of nitrosamine formation.  Plot twist!

The amount of added nitrates in processed meats are now strictly regulated and significantly below typical levels of the 1960s and ‘70s. But not so with the newer “uncured” products.

Q: Wow, this is so crazy. So I can eat this whole charcuterie board and have bacon tomorrow?

A: Yes. Your odds of developing gastric or colon cancer from processed meats are so incredibly small.  And eating foods such as bacon, sausage, salami, and ham instead of refined carbohydrates is much healthier for your whole body in the long run.  These meats do not cause a significant spike in blood sugar or insulin. They keep your insulin balanced so that you do not develop insulin resistance that leads to heart disease, diabetes, and other chronic diseases.

I believe and science agrees that the benefits of eating minimally processed meats as part of a whole food diet far outway the potential harms.  

Plus, when you eat as we do in the Freese Method with plenty of vegetables and other healthy foods, you’re creating a wholistic happy, and healthy body.

I would caution against ultra-processed foods like slim jims and processed meats with added sugars and chemicals that you can’t pronounce. Those are probably not great for a host of reasons.

I do think there is something to say about the risks of eating processed meats if you are insulin resistant, drinking too much alcohol, smoking, and full of inflammation vs. eating processed meat without insulin resistance, having a healthy metabolism and little to no inflammation, and an overall healthy lifestyle. 

I eat bacon. I eat salami. I feed my family these foods.  I also feed them fruits and vegetables and healthy fats.  What you decide to feed yourself and your family is up to you. 

As with most nutrition research and policy, we are always trying to make the best decision with the knowledge that we have right now. Sometimes that makes knowing what to eat confusing.  But that is what science is.  It’s learning, it’s discovering more, it’s changing the way we think about things.

And with that, enjoy your salami my friends.

PubMed Articles Referenced for the article:

PMID: 30305961

PMID: 30208538

PMID: 31917821

PMID: 31694233

PMID: 29529987

PMID: 15284391

PMID: 1985394

PMID: 29311764