BrainStuff Classics: Why Does Hot Food Seem More Satisfying?

Warm foods can feel more filling than chilled foods, but why? Learn the possible explanations behind the cravings in this classic episode of BrainStuff, based on this article: https://recipes.howstuffworks.com/why-hot-food-more-satisfying-than-cold.htm

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:01):
Welcome to brain Stuff, a production of iHeartRadio. Hey brain Stuff,
Lauren vocal bomb here with a classic episode from the
podcast's archives. In this one, we discussed the psychology and
physiology behind a strange food phenomenon, how hot food can
seem more satisfying than cold food, even when both are

(00:22):
delicious and filling. Hey brain Stuff, Lauren vocal bomb here.
You know that ravenously hungry feeling you get after going swimming.
It feels like you could go to an all you
can eat buffet and make them rethink their business strategy.
But although a salad, or a granola bar, or even
a nice smoothie would probably satisfy you, a voice echoing

(00:42):
out of the deepest recesses of your brain commands you
to feed it something warm, an entire pizza, perhaps, or
two giant bowls of puff extra frisket please. There could
be a lot of reasons why we crave warm foods
when we're especially hungry, but one of them probably has
to do with the link between smell and taste. We
spoke with doctor Stephensecker, an associate professor in the University

(01:05):
of Alabama Department of Biological Sciences who studies the physiological
design of digestive systems. He said, hot food emanates much
more airborne particles than cold foods, and since a large
part of our taste sensation also involves smell, hot food
would therefore provide positive reinforcement in its selection. Just consider
how quickly the smell of smoke from a barbecue can

(01:27):
make you feel hungry, or how no matter how tasty
it will be, a cold gospot show simply doesn't stimulate
the senses like a warm chili. So even though we
intellectually know that cold soup is going to be good
and fill us up, our olfactory apparatus hasn't yet been
appraised of the situation, making it hard to get all
the parts of the brain on the same gaspacho bandwagon.

(01:48):
But smell may not be the only reason we crave
a hot meal more than a cold one, or rather
it may signal a deeper reason. Since heating food on
locks calories and nutrients, we wouldn't be able to get
eating the food raw, and since our big brains are
very calorie needy, our preference for hot meals might have
something to do with our brains steering us towards the
most potential calories possible in the moment of hunger. According

(02:11):
to Richard Wrangum, a biological anthropologist at Harvard and author
of Catching Fire, How Cooking Made Us Human, the important
comparison is between foods that are cooked and differ only
in temperature. He said, hot food very likely yields more
net energy gain than cold food, partly because of changes indigestibility.
One example is that starch becomes increasingly refractory after hot

(02:33):
bread than cools, which could be one reason why we
like hot toast. In the case of lipid rich foods,
the closer of fat is to its melting point when eaten,
probably the easier it is digested. However, Secker clarifies that
chewing and the digestive process are both pretty good at
unlocking nutrients. He said that once you've cooked hamburger, for example,

(02:54):
eating it hot or cold would provide a negligible difference
in calories consumed and digestion effort. But there's also the
nostalgia factor. Smell is the most nostalgia triggering sense. Researchers
aren't entirely sure why this is, but they think it
has to do with the physical way our brains handle
information in the parts known as the limbic system. The

(03:14):
limbic system includes the amygdala, which helps us process emotions,
the hippocampus, which processes and stores memories, and the olfactory bulb,
which processes scent input from our nasal cavity. There are
direct connections among these three brain bits. Studies have shown
that since create more positive and more emotional senses of
nostalgia than other triggers, and scientists think that's because of

(03:36):
these close connections among scent, emotion, and memory in our brains.
While there might be some selected drive hidden in our
behavior to crave cooked food for nutritional gains, our cravings
and our susceptibility to a rich scent in the air
is very likely driven by a nice memory of the
taste and smell of food right off the grill, or
the chicken soup that comforted you when you.

Speaker 2 (03:57):
Were sick as a child. However, even small changes in
temperature can make a big difference in how satisfaction in
food is perceived. It's important to remember that the texture
of foods, and especially fats like those in cheese and
cheese substitutes, changes drastically within a relatively small temperature range.
For example, Cold Pizza Delight or Horror Discuss.

Speaker 1 (04:25):
Today's episode is based on the article why hot food
always seems so much more satisfying than cold Food on
how stuffworks dot Com, written by Jesslinshields. Brain Stuff is
production of by Heart Radio in partnership with how stuffworks
dot Com and is produced by Tyler Klang. Four more
podcasts my heart Radio, visit the Airheartradio app, Apple Podcasts,
or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.