Lowrefined

Lowrefined is an adjective used to describe materials, products, or processes that have undergone minimal refinement or processing from their natural state. The term is most commonly applied in the contexts of agriculture, food science, and materials engineering, where it signals that an item retains many of its original characteristics, such as flavor, nutrient content, texture, or elemental composition. For example, lowrefined grains are whole grains that have had only the outer hull removed, preserving the bran and germ layers that contain vitamins, minerals, and soluble fiber. In metallurgy, lowrefined alloys retain high levels of trace elements that confer specific magnetic or catalytic properties.

The phrase emerged in the early 2000s as part of a growing emphasis on sustainability and health consciousness. It parallels concepts such as "unrefined" or "natural" but highlights a particular degree of processing—enough to make a product usable or marketable but not so much that it strips away the inherent qualities of the raw material. Lowrefined terminology is often featured in marketing materials, scientific literature, and regulatory documents. Regulatory agencies, such as the Food and Drug Administration in the United States, sometimes use the term to differentiate between products that have undergone extensive extraction or purifying steps and those that have not.

Related terms include "highly refined," "minimally refined," and "whole." Lowrefined is occasionally contrasted with "organic," though the two are independent descriptors; an organic product can be lowrefined or highly refined depending on the processing applied.