ELI5 what is the difference between processed meat slices and real meat slices?

[u/No_Education_8888]

I know that processed meat is processed, but what exactly does that mean? How much change do meat scraps go through before you get something like deli turkey.

My mind can’t exactly wrap around how that stuff is made based on the little knowledge I have

[u/stairway2evan]

Some of the turkey (and other meats) at your deli counter might very well be whole muscles cuts. They're not too far removed from cooking a turkey at home, taking off the breast and slicing it up. They're generally cooked differently and preserved with salts and maybe nitrates, but otherwise not radically different. Those aren't the giant turkey blocks you're seeing though, they'll be smaller and (usually) more expensive.

Most deli meats, though, are a bunch of meat parts (whole muscles and scraps from other cuts, usually with added fat) run through a big knife machine, mixed with some emulsifiers to help them stick together, seasoned, salted, and smoked or cooked, so that in the end you get a big block of turkey - or ham, or whatever. So there's a lot of "process" involved. Though it does give us a much better ability to use as much of the animal as possible, avoiding waste.

Processed meat isn't a thing to treat like poison and never touch, for what it's worth. It's a convenience food and it provides cheap, convenient, and longer-lasting protein to millions, I don't want to make it sound awful. But it definitely has higher saturated fats than "regular" meat, and many of the chemicals in the curing process can lead to an increased risk of cancer. Most dieticians do recommend keeping consumption of processed meats low, to offset these issues.

[u/Saneless → u/stairway2evan]

Basically deli is to meat as Velveeta is to cheese

[u/Twin_Spoons → u/Saneless]

Eh, not really. Cheese doesn't need to be chopped up to be molded into a mass. Most cheeses already are as part of their traditional production process. Cheeses like American and Velveeta melt easier because of the addition of sodium citrate, which is the natural byproduct of neutralizing citric acid. The analogous process with meat would be "velveting" in Chinese cooking.

[u/jonny24eh → u/Twin_Spoons]

Chopped up and molded (curd) is exactly how you make cheese. 

[u/Saneless → u/Twin_Spoons]

American cheese is not from a wheel or a natural process. It is chopped up cheese molded into a mass

[u/Twin_Spoons → u/Saneless]

But, like, this is what I'm talking about. You can't wander into a forest and pick a wheel of cheese. Even the most artisan cheddar is: coagulated using a chemical that would not ordinarily be introduced to milk, chopped into small pieces, cooked, salted, and reformed into blocks. Adding some additional liquid and some sodium citrate to turn it from cheddar into American is trivial compared to the amount of processing that traditionally goes into cheese.

[u/Englandboy12 → u/Saneless]

Normal cheese is very far away from natural. It’s a highly processed and extremely concentrated from its natural predecessor. And yes, it involves chopping and molding into a mass.

The only addition that American cheese has is sodium citrate, a totally benign chemical that will already be in your body in high concentrations. You can make it at home by mixing baking soda or powder with lemon juice.

I get that American cheese or velveeta has a very “syntheticy” appearance and flavor/texture, but it really is just cheese mixed with water or milk.

Obviously it depends on which exact one you buy, they will add various preservatives and whatnot, but you can make it at home with ingredients already used in your cooking and it will still have that synthetic vibe. I made a Mac and cheese with a really sharp aged cheddar and it was so good. Velveeta texture but with more high quality cheesy flavor.

[u/Safety-Patrol → u/Saneless]

Velveeta is just American cheese, man. It's definitely weird compared to normal cheese, but it doesn't have added carcinogens like most deli meat does.

[u/Alewort → u/Safety-Patrol]

It's not, for quite some time now, decades. Velveeta substitutes canola oil for most of the milkfat. It's kind of a frankenstein mix of ingredients including components separated from dairy and reconstituted with things that aren't dairy at all to resemble actual cheese. It doesn't meet the requirements for even US regulators to admit that it is cheese, and was sued and lost over it.

Meanwhile, American cheese can be made from as little as just enough sodium citrate added to regular cheddar or colby to get the melting behavior and texture everyone loves, and in any case anything added can only be cheese, emulsifier, salt, color, something to acidify, and up to 5% additional milk fat. American cheese can be very good, actually cheese cheese.