Food Preferences

Most people have strong food preferences which are almost entirely learned. The book First Bite by Bee Wilson offers an excellent review of the study of eating habits and food preferences. Wilson references hundreds of experiments and studies of eating. Her observations and conclusions should be very helpful for those trying to eat a healthier diet or lose weight.

The French designed Sapere Project introduces children to a variety of unfamiliar foods. Pre-school children are divided into small groups and given a variety of foods which they are encouraged to handle, taste and discuss. Each food is offered several times over a period of a few months. Parents report that children request and eat a much wider variety of foods at home; their palates expand without coercion. Finnish educators modified this technique to emphasize fruits and vegetables, using it in a large number of kindergartens countrywide. Several years later control groups of children were compared to those who had been exposed to the Sapere technique. The Sapere group had much less overweight and obese children. This technique has been tried in teenagers and residents of retirement homes with similar results, but changes are greater when it is applied to children up to six years old. All groups on whom this has been used enjoyed the process and the results.

In parts of the world where spicy foods are common and preferred, children usually start to try these foods around age five and they don't like them. Since the older people eat and enjoy the spicy foods children keep trying them and eventually prefer them. Everyone who eliminates all added salt for a month comes to prefer less salt on food. Avoiding all sweets for two weeks allows less craving for them. These sorts of trial periods allow children and adults to come to prefer something besides the high sugar, fat and salt of the standard American diet which is captured so well in fast and prepared foods. "Eating is a skill that each of us learns, and we retain the capacity for learning it, no matter how old we are."

Happy childhood memories of unhealthy foods like candy bars, ice cream and extra rich holiday meals are strongly imprinted. We eat these foods to regain that time and place with terrible results for our waistline and health.

Wilson also examines other approaches to health through better eating habits. She concludes that exercise is healthy but not a major source of weight loss unless done to potentially dangerous extremes. Taking small tastes of healthy foods over and over often allows an expansion of good dietary options. Smaller plates and wineglasses cut down on consumption. Soup before or during the meal has the same effect mainly because it's hard to eat soup quickly and slower eating by any technique cuts calorie consumption. Foods grown and/or prepared yourself are more enjoyed and appreciated.

            Understanding Diabetes

Most diabetics don't understand their disease. This is usually because their physicians don't understand diabetes either.

Unfortunately it is not uncommon for diabetics whose blood sugar has been controlled by diet and/or oral drugs to have their blood sugar skyrocket because the pancreas no longer produces enough insulin. This overworked organ has failed and effectively their type 2 diabetes has become type 1 diabetes. Insulin is now necessary to maintain normal blood sugar levels. A tragedy often ensues. The patient assumes that an unhealthy diet is now okay since they can just take more insulin to control blood sugar levels. This is the basic misunderstanding of diabetes.

A good analogy for diabetes is a brush fire.  Brush fires are usually easily handled unless they start in California during the dry season. Diabetics are like dry season California. They have the underlying conditions to allow massive damage mainly because of vascular disease which is always present in diabetics. Macro-vascular disease leads to heart attacks, heart failure, strokes, limb infections and amputations. Microvascular disease leads to dementia, blindness, kidney failure, neuropathy. Diabetics on insulin have hugely increased rates of all these conditions.

The only way to avoid the progression of this vascular disease is through diet. Blood sugar control with insulin helps; it postpones the dreadful vascular complications for a while. But only diet prevents them. A good diet is like a long, drenching rainfall for California fires; it is the only way to prevent and treat diabetic complications. As prior blogs have explained, this means little or no animal products including dairy, vegetable oils, refined sugars and refined grains, salt. Good diet also requires plenty of vegetables, fruits, legumes, nuts, seeds, herbs and spices to provide nutrients necessary for health of blood vessels and all organ systems.

                     Eating Awareness Training

The first book I recall reading about diet is Eating Awareness Training written in 1985 by Molly Groger. It's subtitle is "The Natural Way to Permanent Weight Loss." Groger observed that her friends of optimal weight took food in more deliberately and often left food on their plates rather than finishing portions. She changed to this eating style, lost weight, and maintained good body weight with this approach. Her technique was to pay attention to the eating process, chew food thoroughly, and not eat while watching TV or reading. When she realized she was full she stopped eating.

Mindfulness techniques adapted from Buddhist meditation practices have been applied to eating, effectively the same approach Groger advocated.

German researchers recently designed an experiment in which obese people had their mouths wired so that they could not eat quickly or put a large amount in their mouths. There were no restrictions on types of food or quantity. All subjects lost significant weight, often in the hundreds of pounds, and many maintained much of the weight loss after the mouth wiring was removed. They had learned to eat more deliberately and consume less food.

My observations of overweight people support this approach. Many eat large quantities quickly and robotically not allowing time to recognize satiety (or often even enjoy their meal.) For those trying to lose weight this is a logical, painless way to cut back on calories without formal dieting.