Health First : Are You What You Eat?

By Dave Fuller

In1826 a fellow named Anthelme Brillat-Savarin wrote, in Physiologie du Gout, ou Meditations de Gastronomie Transcendante,

"Dis-moi ce que tu manges, je te dirai ce que tu es." [Tell me what you eat and I will tell you what you are].

This phrase has been used through the years and was later made popular by author Adelle Davis in the 1960’s who wrote a book with the same title. 

Sometimes its hard to imagine that what we put into our bodies has a relationship to who we are but there is some hard evidence to suggest that foods do have an impact on how we act, how we think and how we feel.

Dr. Stephen Schoenthaler, a Professor of Criminal Justice at the California State University has found that there is a link between food and criminal activity (1). 

Dr Schoenthaler found that by removing junk food from detention centers for youth he was able to reduce the number of violations of house rules by 47%. 

In a very recent study published in the British Journal of Nutrition:  in 2007 (2) found that a junk food diet during pregnancy exacerbated the taste for junk food in young and encouraged a greater propensity for obesity in rat offspring. 

So not only do bad eating habits  poorly affect you, but it can affect your offspring.

 Finally, a study published in Brain, Vol. 124, No. 9, 1720-1733, September 2001 Oxford University Press found that there is a relationship between food and brain activity.

So is what you are thinking related to what you have just eaten??… perhaps we all need to think about that next time we blow up or feel stressed?

I wonder if the sales for those foods that are making our society obese, sick and unmotivated would be the same if all of us started thinking about what we are putting in our body and considering how we feel after we eat.

Dave Fuller is the owner of Ave Maria Specialities and Mother Maria’s Market in Prince George.

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