Changing Tastes

It is easy to form the belief that foods that appeal to us must be healthy, or at least okay to eat. Listen to what your body asks for and you will know what to give it. This may have been close to correct in the environment in which we evolved. Now, it is not even close to true, thanks to our ability to manufacture hyper-palatable foods that turn our evolved preferences for sweet, salt, and fat into traitors to our health. Our tastes are tuned and conditioned by the products we eat, and, unless we are careful, our preferences lead us to eat foods that are no longer good for us. We come to prefer these foods over the natural, whole foods we should eat, creating a vicious cycle. Our cravings tell us to eat more of the products that make us fat and sick.

I have not forgotten all the foods I loved that I no longer eat. I used to love a Reuben sandwich with a heap of steak fries and mayo-drenched coleslaw, and ate that meal many times. If I were to eat it now, it would probably make me sick. I hope it would. I can come close to that while eating relatively healthy by using fake meat, baked potato wedges, and mayo-free healthy slaw. I have done so, and am not inclined to do it often. For me, evolving towards a whole food, plant-based lifestyle includes losing one’s desire to eat meat. I remember craving meat, but no longer experience it. There is no need to find vegan substitutes once one’s tastes change. Can you imagine going the other way, desperately seeking an animal-based substitute for spicy black beans in order to satisfy an uncontrollable craving?

I remember not caring much for oranges. They were too sour and too messy. I could enjoy an apple or a banana, but seldom an orange. Now they are a favorite. Peel and section it, or just cut it into wedges. The oranges have not changed much, but my tastes have. When you stop overindulging in sugar and salt, foods that are naturally sweet taste really sweet. Just a little salt really enhances flavor, and it does not take very much to reach the point where it tastes too salty. A bite of very dark chocolate becomes a mood improving drug when eaten mindfully. The immunity I built up to caffeine when I drank six cups of coffee daily prevented me from using coffee to enhance my alertness when it would have benefitted me to do so. Similarly, the tolerance one builds up by adding sugar and salt to everything, prevents one from tasting the natural flavors of whole foods. These are addictions, and we can overcome them, but to do so, we have to go through withdrawal.