Not likely. All sensory receptors get desensitised if they are repeatedly stimulated. If the food tastes really good, it might take a bit longer for receptors to get desensitised. If the food doesn’t taste that appealing, the sensory specific satiety might develop earlier. Yes, you won’t be able to eat chocolate and croissants forever. That’s why when your nutritionist is telling you to allow yourself to eat any foods and stop following restrictive diets, they are onto something.
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Why Is There Always Room for Dessert?
Daria Fennelly • March 7, 2021
What is sensory specific satiety?
Sensory Specific Satiety is the science behind ‘there is always room for dessert’ phenomenon. It refers to the declining satisfaction when consuming a certain type of food again and again, and the consequent renewal in appetite when exposed to a new type of food. To put it simpler, when we are eating the same food again, and again, and again, we stop enjoying it, and gradually lose interest in eating it anymore.
Why is it happening?
Some think it’s because the need for calories is going down. When we are eating the same kind of food, we keep on gaining the same kind of nutrients, and as we no longer need these nutrients for the energy and body functioning, we don’t enjoy them that much. Others say it’s due to the amount of sensory stimulation. The repeated stimulation might lead to desensitisation. That’s why, for example, if we are eating something sweet, and are given a new sweet food, we might not enjoy it that much. It’s all because both foods stimulate our sensors in the same way (this would be even more true for foods with similar textures). Repeated stimulation results in sensory specific satiety. At the same time, if we are eating something sweet, and are given something salty, we might enjoy a new food as if we are hungry.
Are any foods exempt?
What does it mean when putting a meal on your plate?
When you are cooking a meal, you want to include a variety of flavours, textures, shapes, colours. Greater variety should lead to a greater satisfaction, and might enhance the perception of quality and pleasantness of an overall meal. On a physiological level, our sensory organs are stimulated more. On an instinctive level, different tastes and textures represent different nutrients, and trying to get different nutrients is a very important survival strategy.
Is it why Peking duck is so irresistible?
The peking duck is a great example of a meal which stimulates our sensors. We have a salty, fat, and tender duck with a crispy skin. We add the chewy dough, fresh onions, crunchy cucumber, and the sweet sauce. Combined together we get a variation of textures, temperatures, colours in one mouthful. So we get the maximum stimulation of our sensors, and that’s why the Peking duck is so irresistibly tasty.
Does it mean I’m going to eat more?
When we are putting a meal following sensory specific satiety principles, we might end up with something very delicious. And if something is very tasty, we might want seconds. That’s why many nutritionists might recommend going for bland meals if you think your portions are too big. On the other hand, if you are worried about the amount of snacks and desserts you are eating, you might try and stimulate more sensors with your main meals, as it might help you to tame cravings for snacks and desserts.
A practical task
Are you ready to experiment yourself? Here is a practical task from ‘The science of Gastronomy’ course by the Hong-Kong university of science and technology. This practical task will help you to see why sometimes you don’t want to eat a certain food and sometimes you want to eat more.
You will need to make 4 meals with 10 pieces of food each. You will need to eat a first piece, wait a minute, eat the second piece, wait a minute, and do the same until you eat the last piece. For every piece of food, once you’ve eaten it, you want to give it a ranking from 1 to 10 how pleasant it was (10 being the most pleasant, 1 being the least pleasant).
So you will need: a chocolate bar, a bag of wine gums, a bag of crackers, a notepad and a pen or your phone to take rankings.
Meal 1: 9 pieces of wine gums + 1 small piece of chocolate (you will start with wine gums, and once you have all 9, you will have a piece of chocolate).
Meal 2: 9 small crackers + 1 small piece of chocolate (again, you eat crackers first, then chocolate).
Meal 3: 4 wine gums + 5 crackers + 1 piece of chocolate (start with wine gums, then move onto crackers, and finish with chocolate).
Meal 4: 10 pieces of chocolate.
Hopefully, your results can show you how your satisfaction with food decreases if you keep eating the same food, how it renews if you are eating something new, and how no matter how appealing the food is (chocolate in this experiment), eventually a sensory specific satiety would kick in and you will start getting a lower level of satisfaction from the appealing food. Personally, I also found this experiment useful in teaching me how many bites are the most pleasant for me, it’s 5. So whenever I’m craving something ‘naughty’, I try and take 5 small bites first. Most of the time, this allows me to be mindful with how much I eat.
Hopefully knowing about sensory specific satiety and how it works will help you to jazz up your go to meals and enjoy them even more! Not to mention that it might teach you how to eat chocolate whenever you want to without being afraid to eat too much of it.
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