Why Does Unhealthy Food Taste Good?

[igor_kavinski]

In old times, I think drying meat in the sun and salting it was the only preservation method they knew. At least in freezing climates, they had natural ice refrigeration.

 

[nakedfrog]

In old times, I think drying meat in the sun and salting it was the only preservation method they knew. At least in freezing climates, they had natural ice refrigeration.

Allow me to introduce you to the Yakhchāl : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yakhchāl

 

[BoomerD]

Food companies and cooks for that matter, learned a LONG time ago...if you can't make it GOOS, make it a bit salty.

 

[nakedfrog]

Food companies and cooks for that matter, learned a LONG time ago...if you can't make it GOOS, make it a bit salty.

Mmmm, Spam! 🤩

 

[igor_kavinski]

HUNGER FOR SALT FOUND TO BE POWERFUL INSTINCT (Published 1983)

www.nytimes.com

We crave salt because of our brains.

 

[Torn Mind]

HUNGER FOR SALT FOUND TO BE POWERFUL INSTINCT (Published 1983)

www.nytimes.com

We crave salt because of our brains.

Some people are more prediposed to crave sweets over salt. Others the opposite.

I happen to be a sweet craver(thanks for letting me know, ancestry). Thus, too much salt is very much repulsive to me. "Just enough" is how I like it, and I absolutely abhor most peanut butter because of salt.

The article is deficient however, as many salty foods are also quietly "insulin'd" up as well with the likes of dextrose, maltodextrin, etc.
Thus, my mother's stir-fry where meat is coated with cornstarch will trigger a ravenous response both immediately and a couple hours later(which correlates with the rise and fall of insulin levels). Whereas, cooking straight ground beef and just adding salt doesn't do the same. Adding sloppy joe sauce to ground beef does something similar as the stir-fry with cornstarch-coated meat.

It also held to the old romanticized belief(derived from "science") that humans were strictly vegetarians and not liver+marrow hunters.

Given the white collars were paid off by suits, it is no surprise the layperson was not given a fully informative article, and I'll bet plenty paid the price of a morbid life or short life.

 

[sdifox]

The request was for natural foods. Bacon is far from natural since it is cured and filled with items that are not naturally occurring in pork belly. That said, 3 slices of bacon have less calories than a can of Mountain Dew and have lots of protein. I wouldn't call bacon extremely healthy due to the curing process, but it is far from unhealthy (the "fat is bad" myth has been disproven so many times).

Nothing stops you from making bacon without nasty chemicals.