VIDEO
Enjoyable Eating for Your Highest Health
What Makes Eating So Enjoyable?
Twenty-one-year-old Rachel usually eats a breakfast of cereal and milk right before her morning nutrition class.
However, recently, as she listened to her instructor’s gripping lecture on digestive enzymes, she noticed a bloating feeling in her stomach, followed by an urgent need to run to the bathroom. On her way out of the classroom, she suddenly had severe cramping, which caused her to double over in pain.
She initially thought that the cramps must be caused by something “bad” that she ate, or about of stomach flu. She thought it would pass as a temporary problem. But over time, she noticed it happening more often, particularly after a lunchtime sandwich or when she has pasta for dinner.
Can you guess the reason for Rachel’s discomfort after she eats? Would you be surprised to learn that Rachel is not alone in her post-meal digestive issues? We’ll discuss several common ailments of the digestive tract; we’ll also explore the process of digestion and the organs involved.
As much fun as it is to eat, you’re not just taking in food for fun. Food satisfies a genuine physical need. Eating food and drinking fluids often begins with the sensation of either hunger or thirst. The amount of food that we eat and the timing of our meals are driven by physical needs.
Appetite is another powerful drive, but it is often unreliable. Appetite is influenced by our food preferences and the psychological stimulation to eat. In other words, you can become interested in food, pursue food, and experience the desire to eat too much food without actually needing nourishment or being hungry.
We will discuss many factors that affect how, when, and why you eat, so you know that everything from your social situation to your cultural heritage will influence what you put on your plate. Beyond these external factors, there are qualities in foods that affect your desire to eat them. Taste and aroma are two of these qualities.
We Develop a Taste for Certain Foods
Everyone enjoys eating food that tastes delicious, but what exactly is taste? There are five basic categories of taste: sweet, salty, sour, bitter, and savory (“umami”). Most taste buds are located on the tongue, but additional taste buds are found in the throat and elsewhere in the mouth. Food scientists estimate that each of us has at least 10,000 taste buds.
Even though we each have our own favorite foods, we share some taste traits. In general, we all have an innate preference for sweet, salty, and fatty foods.
There is a scientific explanation for these preferences. Sugar seems to elicit universal pleasure (even among infants), and the brain seeks pleasure. 1 Salt provides two important electrolytes (sodium and chloride) that are essential to your body and can stimulate the appetite. Your liking of both sugar and salt makes carbohydrate-rich foods appealing to you. Foods rich in carbohydrates provide the fuel that your body needs daily.
High-fat foods not only have rich textures and aromas that round out the flavors of food, but also provide essential nutrients that are critical to your health. 2 Thus, while we tend to enjoy rich sauces, gravies, and salad dressings, we are, at the same time, meeting our nutritional needs.
Sometimes, our food preferences and our nutritional needs conflict. We may eat too much because the food is so pleasurable. When there is a reason to change our food habits, such as a need to lose weight or reduce salt or fat intake, we realize how challenging it can be to control our food choices.
How does the brain recognize taste? When food is consumed, portions of the food are dissolved in saliva. These fluids then make contact with the tongue’s surface. The taste (gustatory) cells send a message to the brain. The brain then translates the nerve impulses into taste sensations that you recognize.
Aromas and Flavors Enhance the Pleasure of Eating
The sensing structures in the nose are also important to the ability to taste foods. The average person is capable of distinguishing 2,000 to 4,000 aromas. We detect food aroma through the nose when we smell foods and, as we eat, when food odors enter the mouth and migrate to the back of the throat and into the nasal cavities.
The average person has about 10 million to 20 million olfactory cells (odor cells) in the nasal cavity. Therefore, both your mouth and your nose contribute to the tasting of foods. This explains why you lose interest in eating when you have a cold or other forms of nasal congestion.
Food loses some of its appeal when you can’t smell it. Both the taste and the aroma of a food contribute to its flavor. The term flavor also refers to the complete food experience. For example, when you eat a candy bar, you sense a sweet taste, but the flavor is chocolate.
The presence of fat tends to enhance the flavor of foods. When the fat content increases, the intensity of the flavor also increases, as many aromatic compounds are soluble in fat. Increased fat content causes the flavor of food to last longer compared with flavor compounds dissolved in water.
Flavors dissolved in water are quickly detected, but also quickly dissipated. This explains why most people prefer premium ice cream over frozen popsicles. It also explains why several low-fat foods have an acceptable flavor, but they are not as delicious as their high-fat counterparts.
The Take-Home Message
The five categories of taste are sweet, salty, sour, bitter, and savory (umami). Humans have an innate taste for salty, sugary, and fatty foods. The tastes and aromas of foods are a big part of what makes eating pleasurable. Flavor includes both taste and aroma. In general, the higher the fat content, the more intensely flavored the food.
The word umami means “delicious” in Japanese.
Terms:
Hunger – The physical need for food.
Thirst – The physical need for water.
Electrolytes – Charged particles (positive or negative ions). Vomiting and diarrhea cause the loss of electrolytes from your body.
Appetite – The psychological desire to eat or drink.
