The main reason I got into advertising as a career was that I always liked products. I know that sounds silly, but I clearly remember being fascinated by commercials for cleaning products that miraculously removed stains. I also grew up in the dawn of the convenience food era. Frozen foods were pretty new because only recently had a large enough portion of households acquired freezers. Pre-prepared foods were called TV Dinners because they came in aluminum trays that you could take into whatever room your family's TV set was, (Yes, set. I didn't know anyone who had more than one. They were huge and expensive). We had them when we had a babysitter. Fried chicken with mashed potatoes and peas. All in a tray. Amazing.

So now, with every conceivable kind of food now available in pre-prepared form, and microwaves at the ready to heat anything, whatever are the geniuses who invented convenience foods doing?

As far as I can tell, they are working along 2 different paths. First, there are what I think are referred to as superfoods. These are familiar sorts of foods that have been "improved" by filling them with things that are good for you with minimal noticeable change to the way they look or taste. The most obvious one we have around is pasta. You know what's in pasta? I've made pasta. It has two ingredients. Flour and water. I have to say that I'm impressed by how companies like Barilla have tried to make pasta better for you while using pretty natural ingredients. But I don't expect my pasta to include lentils, chickpeas, flaxseed, barley, spelt, oats, egg whites and oat fiber (guess there even oats has to be enriched with oat fiber). This give Barilla Plus extra protein, and fiber, plus ALA Omega-3 fatty acids which the label said is essential, though it doesn't mention what it is essential for.

Is this bad? Depends on what you mean. All of those things (except for spelt, which I'm pretty sure doesn't really exist) are good for you, and the stuff tastes pretty much like you'd expect pasta to taste. So that's good. But does it lower the incentive for people to eat a real healthy diet consisting of real foods? Of course it does. Why eat foods that naturally contain protein, fiber and essential fatty acids when you can get it packed into a noodle?

The other thing food scientists are doing is making food even cooler. My favorite that I saw today was packaged cake mix to make cupcakes with creamy filling like a Twinkie. I'm guessing that the fatty acids in those aren't the essential ones.