Why does fat taste so good

In fact, one study found that rats would go after the fatty, unhealthy foods , even while receiving punitive shocks. This biological love of fat is hardwired into our brains for a very good reason. Foods taste good because they have the nutrients our bodies need to survive — fat included. In order to keep such an energy expenditure running at a high rate, ancient humans needed a lot of calories.

There is now a belief that eating fat may have been what initially set us apart from other animals and made us distinctly human. Of all the animals in the world, humans have the most developed brains overall.

For comparison, this is about 16 times as much as the entire skeletal system uses. So, in order to keep such an energy expenditure running at a high rate thus keeping our brains developing , ancient humans needed a lot of calories. By developing a hunger for fat, humans were able to encourage eating fat regularly until we got to where we are today.

Unfortunately, fat does still remain unhealthy for you in large amounts. But, once you know why it tastes good to us, especially with cooking, you can be clever with how you use it. Utilize it strategically in your dishes to maximize the impact so you can still enjoy your fat without gaining the fat around your midsection. And remember, that craving for fried food or creamy ice cream is the product of generations of humans who needed those cravings to survive.

Just make sure to stay active or account for it later! Just like you, your health is one of a kind. What works for one person may not for another, so the information in these articles should not take the place of an expert opinion. Before making significant lifestyle or diet changes, please consult your primary care physician or nutritionist. If scientists can find a way to develop nonfattening foods that latch onto the fat receptors, they may be able at long last to develop fat-free snacks that can actually trick the tongue.

Register or Log In. The Magazine Shop. Login Register Stay Curious Subscribe. Newsletter Sign up for our email newsletter for the latest science news. Sign Up. Already a subscriber? Want more? Despite a previous belief to the contrary, fat does have flavor after all.

Prevailing theory allows for five food tastes: the venerable sweet, salty, sour, bitter and the more recently discovered umami, which is evoked by monosodium glutamate MSG. Fat, according to this view, only provides texture to food. But animal studies have suggested that there are chemical signals at work for detecting fat via taste or smell. So Richard Mattes and graduate students in his laboratory at Purdue University recruited 19 adults willing to eat cream cheese in the name of science.

After fasting overnight and having their blood fat levels tested, the subjects ate up. Some people both tasted and smelled the fatty cheese, others just tasted it and some only smelled it while the control group received no sensory stimulation at all.

The scientists found that the blood fat levels of subjects who both tasted and smelled the food rose three times more than those of the control group. The fat levels of the subjects who tasted while wearing nose plugs rose a similar amount.