Weight Loss Coach Reveals 3 Foods She’d Never Buy

It’s on the moon pie.

Jenna Rizzo, a weight loss coach from Georgia, is sharing the three types of foods banned from her home — individually wrapped pastries, sodas and fruit juices, and packaged vegan foods.

“If you like these foods, go ahead and eat them,” Rizzo advised her 83,000 TikTok followers in a video this month. “It’s just in my personal experience that these foods aren’t generally conducive to overall health and weight loss goals, but it’s your life.”

Individual pastries

Rizzo put Little Debbie Snacks, HoneyBuns and Pop-Tarts on her naughty list.

“These foods are on the banned list because we know they really don’t provide a lot of nutritional value for us — too high in saturated fat, too high in processed sugar,” Rizzo explained.

Packaged desserts are ultra-processed foods known to be high in calories, sugar, fat and salt and little or no vitamins or fiber.

However, these shamed foods are responsible for 60% of Americans’ daily calorie intake.

UPFs have been linked to 32 bad health outcomes, including a higher risk of cardiovascular disease, cancer, metabolic syndrome, obesity, non-alcoholic fatty liver disease, type 2 diabetes and even premature death.

But that doesn’t mean Rizzo eschews sweets entirely.

“I really like sweets,” she said. “If I want a pastry, I’ll go to my local bakery and get something that’s made fresh and with love, not something that’s meant to sit on the shelf for 13 months.”

Soda and fruit juices

Sodas have long had a bad reputation for being high in sugar and calories, but lacking in vitamins, minerals or fiber. However, fruit juices have gained a mixed reputation.

“I think we can all agree that we know soda isn’t the healthiest thing, but fruit juices usually surprise a lot of people,” Rizzo reasoned. “That’s because they’re thinking they’re drinking this good, healthy thing. In reality, most juices are like a bunch of processed sugar made to taste like grape or apple.

Sugar-sweetened beverages — which include soft drinks, fruit drinks, sports drinks, energy drinks and sweet water, soft drinks, coffee and tea — provide the most added sugar in the diet of American adults, according to a 2023 study in the journal Nutrients.

Nearly seven in 10 adults have made SSBs part of their weekly diet, with 38% admitting to drinking at least one or more a day.

SSB consumers are at risk of gaining weight, developing type 2 diabetes and heart disease, experiencing tooth decay and impaired brain function.

Rizzo prefers to make juice at home so he can control the ingredients.

Packaged vegan food

Rizzo beef is specifically UPF vegan – not all foods are vegan.

“People see that label that it’s vegan and automatically think it’s going to be the healthier option,” Rizzo said. “Eating these fake meats, butters and cheeses that literally have an ingredient list longer than a CVS bill did nothing more for my health.”

A recent study linked plant-based UPF with a 7% higher risk of cardiovascular disease than unprocessed plant-based foods.

Rizzo finds that it’s simply better to eat high-quality, natural foods.