University nutrition students in Adelaide are trying to rebuild a Twistie from supermarket ingredients, and finding that a snack so familiar is almost impossible to replicate in a home kitchen.
The exercise is part of the Future Foods course at Adelaide University, where students of Human Nutrition and Nutrition and Food Sciences use cheese, corn and rice flour, spices and a deep fryer. They produce something that resembles a cheese-covered snack, but without high-pressure manufacturing, precise temperatures and industrial machinery, the trademark shape, puff and crunch are almost impossible to match.
Dr Nina Wilson said the aim is to show how ultra-processed foods (UPFs) differ from everyday foods.
“Twisties might look like a relatively simple snack, but trying to recreate them from everyday ingredients quickly shows students just how formulated these foods are,” Dr Wilson said.
“Ultra-processed foods typically rely on industrial ingredients, additives and specialised manufacturing processes that simply aren’t available in the average kitchen.
“That’s the lesson we want students to take away – to look beyond the finished product and understand what has gone into creating it.”
Why the lesson matters for children
The university describes UPFs as highly formulated foods that typically contain additives and are high in energy, saturated fat, sodium or sugar and low in fibre. They include soft drinks, lollies, chips, processed meats, biscuits and some snack and protein bars.
The release said 81% of new foods released in Australia over the past decade were UPFs, rising to 93% for products aimed at children aged 5 to 12. That statistic comes from a 2025 study in Nutrients of 1,770 packaged foods and drinks marketed to children up to age 12 between 2013 and 2023. The 81% therefore describes children’s products, not all new foods, and the 93% applies to foods for five- to 12-year-olds.
Consumption is also high. Deakin University researchers found Victorian primary students aged 8 to 12 got 47% of their daily energy from UPFs. The link to weight gain was seen in children aged 10 to 12, not across the whole sample. Adelaide University says high consumption has been linked to overweight and obesity in children, and to higher risks of Type 2 diabetes, cardiovascular disease and some cancers in adults.
Schools in the frame
Interest in what children eat at school is growing globally. In January, the World Health Organization released a school food guideline that for the first time advises countries to take a whole-school approach to ensure food and drinks provided and sold in and around schools are healthy. WHO said about 188 million school-aged children and adolescents were living with obesity in 2025, and it is developing a separate guideline on UPF consumption.
For teachers of food technology, health and home economics, the Adelaide exercise offers a practical model: students learn about processing by attempting it, not by reading labels. Canteen managers and wellbeing leaders, meanwhile, can use the same logic when explaining why a packaged snack differs from its ingredients.
Associate professor Evangeline Mantzioris said awareness of UPFs in everyday diets needs to grow, but she stressed realism.
“It’s unrealistic to expect people to completely eliminate ultra-processed foods from their diets, but even small swaps can make a difference,” Assoc Prof Mantzioris said.
“Snack foods are an easy place to start. Swapping out lollies, soft drinks, biscuits or packaged snack bars for fruit, nuts or homemade items can help increase the amount of whole and minimally processed foods in your diet.
“Our Twisties experiment demonstrates how ultra-processing takes ingredients away from their whole-food origins, breaks down their natural food matrix then reassembles them into a highly formulated product that looks, tastes and feels completely different.
“It’s an eye-opening experience. And once you’ve tried making a Twistie from scratch, you may never look at the packet quite the same way again.”