Overall health foods may be of three types.

1. Conventional foods with identified bioactive phytonutrientWith modern science better able to qualify the bioactivity of our foods, manufacturers ‘call out’ the compounds that confer health benefits. This ‘call-out’ marketing of food products currently constitutes the majority of health foods, e.g., whole wheat atta (flour). Here the manufacturer has called out the presence of wheat bran in the wheat flour that maintains gut health and reduces the risk of some types of cancers. Oats, soy, fish, garlic, flax seed, nuts are other examples.
2. Enriched/fortified/superfortified foodsCurrently the second largest segment of functional products, these incorporate a beneficial bioactive compound into a health food, e.g., vitamins and minerals added as per RDA (or more) for that nutrient. E.g., breakfast cereals fortified with B vitamins, health drinks for children enriched with added vitamins and minerals, juices with calcium, infant formulas with iron, milk with vitamin D, etc.
3. Products engineered for bioactive benefitThe most significant emerging segment of functional products, these constitute products specifically altered with an added ingredient which is not a normal constituent of the health food. For example, rice for diabetics, polished rice grains are coated with anti-diabetic herb extracts and are meant to be cooked without the usual washing. Such rice products claim to counter the high glycemic index of rice. Other examples are tea with added powdered herbals, carbonated waters spiced with herbal extracts such as those from ginger, amla etc. Biscuits with whole nuts, added fibre and foods containing sugar alcohols in place of sugar (sweets for diabetics) are other examples. It is estimated that in the United States more than 250 botanicals often in the form of concentrated extracts are commonly added during food product manufacturing for flavour, fragrance or technical characteristics such as colouring, thickening or preservative activity. These are added as natural ingredient additives for many categories of food products including baked goods, canned goods, meat products, dairy products, candy, non-alcoholic beverages and alcoholic beverages.