We often talk about the visible benefits of eating well, but it's essential to consider how our diet affects our internal health, particularly brain function. Health experts have warned that certain foods can seriously damage our cognitive skills and overall health, especially our ability to learn and remember things.

Felice Jacka, Alfred Deakin Professor of Nutritional Psychiatry, joined ZOE co-founder and CEO Dr Jonathan Wolf on an episode of the ZOE health podcast. They discussed ultra-processed foods, which astonishingly account for around two-thirds of calorie consumption in the US.

Felice described ultra-processed food as "food deconstructed from its original ingredients and put back together again, and it usually has a list of other ingredients that are not found in whole foods."

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She pointed out that these might include synthetic sweeteners, colourings, preservatives, emulsifiers, among others. Ultra-processed foods aren't just obvious culprits like ice cream and crisps; ready meals and some bread varieties can also come under this umbrella.

Felice went on to detail a recent study with young, healthy participants who were served a chocolate milkshake and a cheese toastie for breakfast over four days.

She said: "In one group, their version of that was very high fat, high sugar, and the other version of that wasn't, and they were randomly assigned to both. And what they saw was within four days, they could see an impact on this hippocampal related learning and memory tasks in these young people."

Felice claimed that by improving your diet and cutting down on ultra-processed foods, brain health can be enhanced "as little as three weeks".

Host Jonathan added his thoughts: "You can see that basically people with a bad diet and lots of ultra processed food that actually you can, you can see in real time the sort of hippocampus, shrinking.

"And that's linked to a lot of bad things as well, like dementia. And on the other hand, there is this possibility to improve your diet. It's not too late. You can actually grow your hippocampus. So I love that. It's a bit like going to the gym, but for your brain."