The End of Overeating by Dr David Kessler
I thought that today I would write about a book that changed my eating habits. It is one of my favorite books when it comes to nutrition. I picked it up at the library. I opened it thinking it was a diet book. I was very wrong.
The End of Overeating has more to do with how our food is processed and how the processing effects our bodies. Knowing how certain food can effect your desire to eat too much is very powerful to learn how to stop overeating.
Dr Davis Kessler is Harvard-trained doctor, lawyer, medical school dean and former commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration. That is a lot of credentials. Even armed with all that knowledge, he was overweight man and a yo-yo dieter since college.
Kessler was on a mission to find out why he just couldn't resist certain foods. He enlisted labs and scientists from around the world. He read every medical paper regarding food consumption. He even went dumpster diving in the middle of the night as some of our favorite chain restaurants, like Chili's and Appleby's. His booked is littered with footnotes pointing back to some study or experiment.
What Kessler found was that the body craves fat, sugar, and salt. When these three things combine in certain proportions, the body wants to have more than it needs. The food labels at these chain restaurants revealed a lot more than they want you to know. Some appetizers have 8 or 9 different types of salt listed on the label as well as different fats and sugars. An average appetizer in a chain restaurant is 900 calories and that is before you get you meal.
Foods that are highly processed, like that grilled chicken breast you always order because you are looking out for you weight, may not be the best choice on the menu. These pieces of meat are marinated in sugar, salt and fat and then tenderized to the point that you don't have to chew your food. The foods have become hyper-palatable, according to Dr Kessler. He says, “A hyper-palatable food that requires little chewing and goes down easily”. It also make you want more to eat than you should.
This book has no diet plan. It is just full of knowledge to helps you understand what goes on in your body and your brain when eating certain foods and why they make you want to overeat when clearly you have had enough. It is a must read!
