First Bite: How We Learn to Eat

But in these vast quantities, the milk leaves children anemic (because calcium in the cow’s milk blocks the absorption of iron) and badly constipated, not to mention at risk for obesity from the excess calories. The constipation and the fact that the milk is so filling leave the children with little appetite for proper meals. As a result, they fail

As we take our first bites, our parents are supplying us simultaneously with both nature (genes) and nurture (environment conceived in its broadest sense, including everything from cuisine to family dynamics

The power of convenience foods to insinuate themselves into some of our most precious memories—of family, of happiness, of childhood—should be a pressing concern for everyone who is serious about improving anyone’s diet, including their own.

ketchup became a beloved children’s food partly because it is one of the few elements in a meal a child can add themselves.

This is one reason that weight gain is so hard to reverse—particularly when it is caused by binge eating: the obese have increased gastric capacity, meaning that it takes longer for the stomach to feel full. And if the stomach doesn’t feel full, the brain can’t feel full either.

olfactory receptors—cells in the nose that detect odor molecules—make up the largest single family in the human genome. Out of around 19,000 genes, Axel and Buck found, nearly 1,000—5 percent—are olfactory receptors.

The key period for acquiring preferences is toddlerdom: from ages one to three. But this coincides with the time in children’s lives when they are most maddeningly, willfully reluctant to try anything new.

If our food habits are learned, they can also be relearned.

Genes do make a difference—to the foods we like, the way we taste them, and even how much we enjoy eating—but they turn out to be much less significant than the environment in which we learn to eat those foods.