“Let food be thy medicine and medicine be thy food – Hippocrates”
There is a thin line between overeating when we are hungry to the core and bingeing on foods we crave for. So, what is a food craving? It is an intense urge to eat a specific food like craving for that Ben & Jerry double chocolate ice cream late at night or the double cheese hamburger at lunch hour. Giving in to cravings often leads to guilt and shame. More than 90% of people experience food cravings. Cravings can be visual (watching a poster/ad on tv), auditory (hearing from a colleague or on radio), or olfactory (getting the aroma of freshly baked stuff while passing a bakery).
Have you ever thought about what causes these food cravings? Let’s read further to know more about it.
1} Hormonal Imbalance
Hunger and appetite control hormones – Consumption of high-fat food causes an imbalance in leptin and ghrelin; the hormones that regulate hunger and appetite. Ghrelin increases appetite while leptin suppresses appetite. Ghrelin levels are low and leptin levels are high when a person is obese. Leptin signals the brain if there are enough fat stores in the body but obese people don’t respond to the signal given by leptin. Sleep deprivation also disturbs the levels of these hormones.
Premenstrual Syndrome [PMS] – Hormonal imbalance in estrogen and progesterone before the period increases cravings for high-carb foods. Studies have shown that the desire for foods containing fat increased premenstrually while the desire for carbohydrate did not change. Women with PMS, who were restrained eaters, were more sensitive to food intake.
Stress/Mood/Anxiety/Emotions – Stress leads to an imbalance in adrenaline and cortisol. Adrenaline plays the role of increasing heart rate and blood pressure during a perceived threat (like the emergence of the pandemic/ lockdown). This act makes cortisol increase the sugar (glucose) in the blood. All this influence’s mood, fear or stress and plays a role in modifying the levels of hormones.
Feeling stressed often leads to emotional eating. Have you ever wondered why we always crave foods high in fat, carbohydrates (sweet/savory) foods instead of fruits or vegetables? It is because these foods cause the brain to release feel-good transmitters that lift our mood.
Emotional Eating Cycle
Pregnancy – Hormonal changes in pregnancy intensify the desire for a specific food or sometimes non-food related cravings (pica- signals iron deficiency). These cravings emerge by the end of the first trimester and are at their peak during the second trimester. These cravings can lead to excess weight gain along with an increased risk of developing gestational diabetes or hypertension. Hormonal changes during pregnancy also intensify the sense of smell (which in turn influences taste) and affect food choices.
2} Nutrient deficiency causing cravings
Research suggests there is a link between nutrient deficiencies and food cravings. Below are the foods usually craved for and the nutritional deficiency attached to it.
| Food Craved | Deficiency | What to include in the diet |
| Chocolate | Magnesium | Nuts, seeds, fruits, and vegetables |
| High carb food like pasta or bread | Nitrogen | Meat, fish, nuts, beans |
| Oily foods | Calcium | Milk, cheese, green leafy vegetables |
| Salty foods | Chlorine and Sodium | Fish, nuts, seeds |
| High sugar foods | Vitamin B12 | Fish, eggs, fruits, vegetables, nuts |
3} Lack of physical activity
Research suggests walking 5 minutes every hour reduces food cravings compared to sitting for long hours. A decrease in physical activity is associated with an increase in sweet food cravings. Also, regular aerobic/resistance training exercise is related to a decrease in the intake of high-fat foods/fast foods.
4} Mental imagery
Research shows that food cravings are associated with mental imagery where a person vividly remembers the food eaten. They cannot get their mind off the food and concentrate on work or tasks given to them. This behavior is also seen in addiction. There are particularly three areas of the brain – the hypothalamus, insula and caudate (responsible for memory and pleasure) that cause these food cravings. The opiate receptors (a system that regulates pain, reward, and addiction behavior) if blocked can diminish the person’s desire to have a certain food.
5} Frequency of having a craved food
Decreasing the frequency of consuming foods that are craved for is associated with a decrease in craving for those items over time for weight loss. Thus, for weight loss, people should decrease the frequency of consuming ‘craved foods’ instead of reducing the amount consumed.
Another meta-analysis found that by keeping participants on energy restriction; their overall food cravings, as well as high fat, carbohydrate (starch/sweet), fast food intake decreased over 12 weeks.
Let’s have a look at some of the popular foods craved and the calories from fats and carbohydrates.
| Food | % Calories from fat | % Calories from carbs |
| Chocolate chip cookie | 50% | 46% |
| Potato chips | 55% | 40% |
| French fries | 44% | 50% |
| Chocolate ice cream | 57% | 42% |
| Bacon Double cheeseburger | 41% | 27% |
| Donuts | 25% | 50% |
All these highly processed foods are high in both fats and carbohydrates, and give a sense of pleasure while eating them.
Role of low-calorie beverage in controlling a food craving
Studies have concluded that while low-calorie beverages help to reduce energy intake, they did not help to curb food cravings in the participants. As a result, they gained more control over their food intake and felt less guilt over time.
How do we cope up with our cravings?
Just like Rome wasn’t built in a day; we cannot make drastic changes in our lifestyle (this usually backfires, and we tend to fall prey to our old habits or cravings.) The first step should be to acknowledge the problem whether it is a craving erupting monthly at the time of PMS, or stress or an underlying deficiency. Next, we should make suitable changes in diet – suppose you are nearing PMS so add the particular food that is craved for in a small amount in the diet which doesn’t cause binge eating episodes. Also including the substitute foods in your diet according to the food craved (refer deficiency table) helps. These small changes will lead you to a healthy lifestyle. After all, to live a healthy life is a stronger reason than food cravings.
“Your diet is a bank account. Good food choices are good investments- Bethenny Frankel”
Author – Mariam Chandra
References
http://www.ncbi.nlm.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6411047/
http://www.webmd.com/baby/features/coping-with-pregnancy-food-cravings
