LizCon's Journal, 17 April 2013

I LOVE to cook and I use a ton of spices. The more the food has taste and flavor the more I want to eat it. If it is dull and lifeless, I will only eat what I need to satisfy the hunger.  

I think our taste buds are dulled because of the amount of sugar found in almost everything. I had never appreciated or tasted the natural sweetness in vegetables, or complex flavors of mixing veggies with spices in recipes until I cut sugar and processed foods out of my diet. Now everything I eat is flavorful and I want MORE, not less. Fast food can't compare to how delicious my meals are. I somehow don't go back for more though because I feel full and satisfied with my portions. I've read articles that say that processed foods and sugar do not trigger the full feeling in people, so you never feel satisfied. *shrugs* 

I agree with shadow. I never realized how sweet natural foods were until I cut out all of the processed sugary foods. All processed starchy and sugary foods have things that your body turns to sugar in them therefore everything is sweet, making everything else taste bland. It's also like living in the monkey house, you no longer notice the smell. By this I mean that it takes more and more sugary type foods for you to be able to taste the sugar. My fiance for example loves hot sauce, but if I magically let the bottle sit empty he only needs half as much when he starts back to get the same intense taste that he had before. I cook with different flavors every night, I try to rotate dinner so that we eat around the world/country every week so that nothing gets over done. Tomorrow night is rosemary and onion pork chops, friday night will be asian night with Teriyaki salmon and broccoli with fried "rice" (cauliflower). On mexican night we will have taquitos, in low carb tortillas with cheese and beef cooked in coconut oil and then the tortillas drenched in coconut oil, it makes them melt in your mouth and ups the fat content. My point is, that for people who eat the same thing all the time (sugary/starchy) then they get addicted to those flavors, and your body is addicted to the type of fat that it produces, and you find yourself in a battle to satisfy cravings, never feel full, and everything else you eat is boring because it doesn't have that sweetness on your pallet.  

CORRELATION IS NOT CAUSATION! Whoo hoo! Good for you for Liz...how do you know that?? 

For me, I can't trust my eyes, I trust an intervallic number. I have to weigh my food or I easily overeat. Anyone know a source for herbs and spices that are gluten free (processed in a dedicated facility)?  

Just because two things happen together does not mean one caused the other. It's one of the hardest things to get used to when designing scientific experiments/studies, especially in cognitive science (which I read a lot of). There are theories about why these two things happen together, but a theory is just a guess until you figure out a way to test it, and do so in a controlled environment with repeatable results.  

"My point is, that for people who eat the same thing all the time (sugary/starchy) then they get addicted to those flavors, and your body is addicted to the type of fat that it produces, and you find yourself in a battle to satisfy cravings, never feel full, and everything else you eat is boring because it doesn't have that sweetness on your pallet." This is what I meant by a 3rd thing. It might be that eating a lot of sugary foods causes the tastebuds being dulled from overexposure and puts the pounds on. If I hear of any studies that do figure out what causes what, I'll post about them. 

What do you think of Stevia? Does it create the same addictive urges for sugar that artificial sweeteners do?  

In my experience it does.  

shadowx, you said it. I totally agree with you! Sugar & Salt, I think, is the root of all evil. LOL! Well, maybe not all evil, but many food evils. LOL! It is in all processed food. Since becoming a vegetarian and a more clean eater and eliminating the majority of the processed foods, I can not tell you what a difference it has made in my taste buds. I can taste my food, I feel more satisfied with what I do eat and I feel better. As far as you comment about sugar subs, YES! Since trying to eat omre cleanly and getting rid of most processed food, I have noticed my cravings are 1/2 what they used to be for sugar. When I drink diet coke, I crave more sugary foods. HOWEVER, I will add that when I eat a bite of chocolate I do not have that same intense craving. I can have 1 or 2 squares of Hershey and be satisfied. Also, when I do eat more processed foods then normal or eat more sugar subs, I get more headaches and more cravings. 

Re: Stevia, I haven't read any of the literature about Stevia specifically (as opposed to other no-cal sweeteners) so I hold no public opinion. And while I seen a bunch of studies suggesting there's an addictive urge from anything sweet, I've also seen some that say there's a difference in urges spawned from real sugar and from non-calorie sugar, so the data is mixed. None of the studies have been large enough to say conclusively one way or the other.