Name: First Bite
Rating: 3.8 (29 reviews)
Author: Bee Wilson

What’s in it for me? Understand why you eat the way you do and how you can change bad habits.

Which types of food do you love the most? Do you prefer pizza, sushi or chicken and dumpling soup? If you do have a favorite dish, try now to articulate why you love it. Perhaps your preference has to do with flavor, texture or something more elusive?

More often than not, the foods we love are those with which we grew up, dishes that often appeared on our childhood tables. They somehow connect us to memories of other meals we ate when we were younger.

From your very first bite to your last, what and how you eat influences and changes your palate, teaching your body to crave the flavors that your mind comes to love. Let’s dive into the wondrous world of taste and flavor to figure out what makes your tummy rumble!

In these blinks, you’ll discover

why less than 25 percent of food marketed to children is good for them;
what Japan can teach the rest of the world about eating; and
how nearly half of American men suffer from a delusional self-image.

Think you were born to hate certain foods? Think again. Your palate is built through experience.

Have you given up on the possibility of your child ever liking broccoli or brussels sprouts? It might seem as if children are hardwired to hate certain foods, but this simply isn’t the case.

Researchers, whether neurologists or biologists, agree that our palate isn’t something we’re born with but something we learn.

The mainstream consumer, however, is mostly unaware of this fact. Many of us believe that our love for sweets is an evolutionary phenomenon. Humans learned to seek out sweet foods because, unlike bitter foods, they generally weren’t poisonous. So as sugary treats are everywhere, we can blame our brains for being unable to resist the sweet temptation.

And yet here’s an interesting wrinkle. While humans supposedly crave sweet treats, what one person considers sweet may be thought of as bland and tasteless to someone else.

A 2012 study revealed that some individuals don’t get their sweet fix from sugary cereals, but rather prefer a ball of mozzarella or a sun-ripened cob of corn.

There is plenty of sugar in foods that aren’t immediately thought of as sweet. Consider that nearly a third of the population in Western countries doesn’t reach for sweetened cereals for breakfast.

The most important factor in your palate’s development, far more important than your biological makeup, is your food environment.

Which sorts of foods did you grow up eating? If you didn’t consume a lot of sugar as a child, fresh corn on the cob tastes as sweet as can be. But if you gobbled a lot of processed salty snacks and sweet treats, that ear of corn won’t satisfy your craving for sweetness.

In short, taste isn’t something we’re born with but rather something we learn through eating.

Food marketed to kids today is unhealthy, yet attempts at reform have failed.

The foods that are marketed to children these days might seem harmless, but only until you read the nutrients table on the packaging. The ingredients in many of these food items are nothing short of a nutritionist’s nightmare.

How do companies get away with it? In short, parents let them.

Grandparents that lived with famine or food shortages are prone to fattening up their grandchildren.

Did your grandparents ever encourage you to eat “one more bite”? You might have felt perfectly stuffed, but you certainly didn’t look it to them.

Why? Your grandparents, growing up in an earlier generation, may have had a different experience of food – and potentially of hunger – during their childhood than you.

Dietary change is possible not just on a personal level but a national level. Japan is a key example!

If you’ve ever visited Japan, you may have noticed how few obese Japanese people there are. This isn’t a coincidence: the Japanese diet has made its population one of the world’s healthiest and longest-living.

But there’s more to this example than just the virtues of eating healthily. Japan’s experience shows us that eating habits can be changed for the positive on a nationwide basis.

Key ideas in First Bite

What is First Bite about?

First Bite (2015) reveals the real root of eating problems: our very first childhood experiences with food. Backed by fascinating scientific studies, these blinks explain the perils of marketing food to children and the negative influence of gender norms and well-intentioned families. Finally, they direct us toward positive dietary change.

About the Author

Bee Wilson is a historian and author of many books, including Swindled and Consider the Fork. Also an acclaimed food journalist, Wilson was named food writer of the year in 2002 by BBC Radio and food journalist of the year in 2004, 2008 and 2009 by the Guild of Food Writers for her Sunday Telegraph column, The Kitchen Thinker.

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First Bite summary