Grocery store aisles are overflowing with packaged and processed foods and drinks. Filling our baskets and carts with sodas, frozen prepared meals, and boxes of snack foods is just, well, normal. But have you ever wondered why our taste buds are tantilized by the initial pop and zing of the latest soft drink? Why our hands keep reaching into the chip bag? Why does it all taste so good, and why do we feel the need to keep sipping and munching?
Turns out we have some help from flavoring chemists. The following clip from the CBS program 60 Minutes episode “The Flavorists: Tweaking Tastes and Creating Cravings” explains, quite well, why we have a taste for – and perhaps even an addiction to – processed foods.
Now that we know chemical flavorings, and so-called “natural” flavorings (‘natural strawberry flaver’ can come from a gland in a beaver’s backside,) are involved in just about everything that comes in a bag, bottle or box, will it change our shopping and eating habits?
If we want to live long and healthy lives it w
ill. We will stop buying the processed and packaged convenience and snack foods. Start shopping the perimieter of the grocery store, where the real food is. Learn to cook some easy and delicious meals for real nourishment. And reset our taste buds to the fresh, the delicious, and the real flavors of food.
How do you feel about artificial flavorings?
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