“In contrast to all the other things we work on in life that are far less likely to increase our wellbeing - including dieting - it is astonishing how little effort we put into changing our eating preferences for the better.”
Source: First Bite: How We Learn to Eat
“You were a child once, too. When you arrived in the world, your only food preferences were milk and buried memories from your mother’s diet. Those early weeks were dominated by meals - the stab of hunger, the sweet contentment of being sated - but you could not yet tell dinner from breakfast. You didn’t yet know - lucky you! - what a trans fat was; or a frappuccino. No one had taught you to worry whether you were getting enough protein, or to feel guilt when your stomach was full. You had never watched a fast-food commercial, and on the relative merits of quinoa and macarons you had no opinion. Food was a wide open for you. The great garden of ingredients - from bitter greens to sweet dates - was all equally unknown: all new, all strange, all waiting to be discovered.”
Source: First Bite: How We Learn to Eat
“It may not feel like it, but you never lost your potential to change how you eat. The wonderful secret of being an omnivore is that we can adjust our desires, even late in the game. It won’t happen on the first bite.”
Source: First Bite: How We Learn to Eat
“The fact that millions of children every year can learn to like chilli offers hope to us all; that our next bite can be different from the first.”
Source: First Bite: How We Learn to Eat
“Sugar is not love. But it can feel like it.”
Source: First Bite: How We Learn to Eat
“Eat soup.”
Source: First Bite: How We Learn to Eat
“If it’s not a mealtime and you are wondering which of two ‘healthy snacks’ you should buy, the answer is probably neither.”
Source: First Bite: How We Learn to Eat
“If you want your children to eat better, don’t tell them what to do; eat better yourself.”
Source: First Bite: How We Learn to Eat
“Most of our approaches to feeding children are too short term. We worry about the next five minutes when we should worry about the next five years.”
Source: First Bite: How We Learn to Eat
“Nothing
would be
easier without
you,
because you
are
everything,
all of it-
sprinkles, quarks, giant
donuts, eggs sunny-side up-
you
are the ever-expanding
universe
to me.”
Source: Flora & Ulysses: The Illuminated Adventures