Should I Eat To Craving?

octaviankid · Nov 8, 2014

For awhile, I was eating a ton of sugar (in attempts be Peatarded and just increase my metabolism

) I log my food pretty religiously into chronometer, but decided to just "eat to feel" just to see what happened. And what i noticed, is that when I crave sugar, it is usual quenched by a tablespoon of honey or a cup of OJ (and not my usually 4-6cups)...Also, I noticed I just cannot get enough fat from butter, raw cheese, and whole milk. I started to notice that I was becoming leaner and feel a lot better. I decided to put my numbers in to chronometer just to see what was going on..and the past several weeks I"ve been taking in 150-180g of carbs a day (I was getting 400-600g/day before). (I'm male, 5'10" 200lbs at 12% body fat) so that seems somewhat low...but I feel just fine. I was concerned about going too low carb and becoming ketogenic, but from what i've gathered as long as I get 100g or so a day, i'll stay out of ketosis.....what are you thoughts on this? Do you most of you "eat to craving" or do you go out of your way to eat low fat or high carb, or whatever...Thanks!

lindsay · Nov 8, 2014

I started eating to craving after going starch/carb crazy and getting appendicitis. After my surgery, I was just like whatever, eat what you want. I had no appetite for a week or so following surgery and then it so happened that the only foods I could look at were dairy and eggs. I started getting ridiculous cheese cravings - the really fattening stuff (mozzarella, gouda, cheddar, etc.), which is also high in protein. I've been following my cravings ever since and have shifted over to higher fat & protein rich foods, but I still eat sugar in my coffee or custard, eat oranges and OJ when I need sugar, and eat a few fruit servings per day. That's usually enough for me - if I don't get enough sugar, my body tells me and I eat more fruit or drink more juice. And I've definitely leaned out a little bit, although that could have been from the antibiotics. I also get regular shellfish cravings, but lately my diet has been predominantly vegetarian - albeit, quite well rounded. I think listening to your body is more important than pounding your body full of sugar, which can have a very negative impact as well.

Blossom · Nov 8, 2014

I think if we eat what we are craving we are more likely to enjoy our food. :)

pboy · Nov 8, 2014

eat to craving?!??! what kind of blasphemy is this!

octaviankid · Nov 8, 2014

lindsay said:
I started eating to craving after going starch/carb crazy and getting appendicitis. After my surgery, I was just like whatever, eat what you want. I had no appetite for a week or so following surgery and then it so happened that the only foods I could look at were dairy and eggs. I started getting ridiculous cheese cravings - the really fattening stuff (mozzarella, gouda, cheddar, etc.), which is also high in protein. I've been following my cravings ever since and have shifted over to higher fat & protein rich foods, but I still eat sugar in my coffee or custard, eat oranges and OJ when I need sugar, and eat a few fruit servings per day. That's usually enough for me - if I don't get enough sugar, my body tells me and I eat more fruit or drink more juice. And I've definitely leaned out a little bit, although that could have been from the antibiotics. I also get regular shellfish cravings, but lately my diet has been predominantly vegetarian - albeit, quite well rounded. I think listening to your body is more important than pounding your body full of sugar, which can have a very negative impact as well.

This makes a lot of sense. I'm definitely on cheese craze lol Thanks!

Blossom said:
I think if we eat what we are craving we are more likely to enjoy our food. :)

I totally agree. I was just in the mindset of "No sugar means low metabolism!" Ray Peat is all about non-authoritarism...shoul've known lol.

pboy said:
eat to craving?!??! what kind of blasphemy is this!

lindsay · Nov 8, 2014

pboy said:
eat to craving?!??! what kind of blasphemy is this!

I don't know if you are being sarcastic or not, but I think if most people really listened to their bodies, they would actually choose healthy nourishing foods. Because even if you crave McDonald's, the likelihood is you won't feel good after eating it.

For whatever reason, today I was craving a huge bowl of thai curry and decided to make my own thai curry vegetable soup with chicken broth (They now sell boxed bone broth at whole foods - hooray!!) Boiling the veggies to death as we speak.....

I think eating what you are craving is the most normal thing in the world - women are just more in tune with their cravings because they give birth.

pboy · Nov 8, 2014

yea man, on a serious note though...well as serious as I can be, cravings are an interesting thing, but they will always guide you on the right path. As your palate expands, your cravings will become more accurate and honed. It helps big time if you are preparing your own food and know the exact ingredients, and keep it simple to like 1-3 ingredients max at a time...your body knows whats up, chemically, exactly, it knows how the food digests, what it has and all that...so the more you give it reference experiences that it can understand...aka simple meals, and always knowing exactly what youre consuming, and by expanding your palate, cravings will become more and more honed. Even if something doesn't work out as you follow cravings, youll usually get sublte insights around the time of eating...kind of like craving something else that might pair well or balance the thing you just took in, and if you have any gastric discomfort, by preparing your own food, knowing what it is and keeping it simple, youll be able to identify culprits really easy

lindsay · Nov 8, 2014

ah pboy - so I see you were being sarcastic :)

SaltGirl · Nov 8, 2014

When people crave junk food it is usually because of something in it that the body craves. The problem is that as soon as you get that one(or more) thing you might be also getting ton of bad ***t. For example, I just loved to gorge on pepperoni pizza. The more pepperoni the better. Then I tried to pinpoint what I was enjoying about the taste and realized it was the salt. As soon as I started to add more salt to food in general my craving lessened greatly.

For example now I am enjoying whole milk much better than skim milk and a part of me feels like I might be needing the saturated fat to compensate for something.

This is why I hate when people argue about food addiction and such. I think the body is smarter than just pure food addiction. I remember(coming out of an ED) I craved coke a lot. I then spent a month drinking coke ad libitum. I was drinking probably 2 liters a day. After that month my craving crashed and I just liked having coke occasionally with food. By allowing myself unlimited access(and without guilt) my cravings were satisfied and I could have a healthier relationship with the item in question.

Amazoniac · Nov 8, 2014

Sometimes it's best to interpret the craving and find better options, especially when dealing with industrialized/synthetic food.

Edit: SaltGirl, I do agree with you but it's dangerous to just give in and trust that everything will restablish as expected.
The problem is: if the negatives prevail over the positives you'll run in trouble before getting better..

pboy · Nov 8, 2014

yea amazoniac, that's a good thing to do, and once you start gravitating toward only healthy food, or just whatever you get used to, if theres enough nutrient diversity, youll just start craving from that palate, and it gets better and better the more you honor it then interpret the results intuitively and with much attention to subtle feelings

of course Lindsay!

octaviankid · Nov 8, 2014

Thanks for all the responses guys!

I should probably clarify..by "craving" I"m talking about whole foods (not fast food, synthetics, or junk food)..and I totally agree with you all when you said if you're craving "junk" then there's probably something in it that you need whether it be sugar, saturated fat etc...

I was just a bit "concerned" when I just didn't want much sugar because it seems to be very important to metabolism and eating too much fat may lead to liberation of free fatty acids. All my carbs come from fruit or honey...but the past several weeks I just didn't want much at all...

So I"m guessing my body just needs extra fat and protein now (for some reason).

octaviankid · Nov 8, 2014

octaviankid said:
Thanks for all the responses guys!

I should probably clarify..by "craving" I"m talking about whole foods (not fast food, synthetics, or junk food)..and I totally agree with you all when you said if you're craving "junk" then there's probably something in it that you need whether it be sugar, saturated fat etc...

I was just a bit "concerned" when I just didn't want much sugar because it seems to be very important to metabolism and eating too much fat may lead to liberation of free fatty acids. All my carbs come from fruit or honey...but the past several weeks I just didn't want much at all...

So I"m guessing my body just needs extra fat and protein now (for some reason). I"m thinking maybe my metabolism has healed and bit and is better at storing glycogen.

octaviankid · Nov 8, 2014

Thanks for all the responses guys!

I should probably clarify..by "craving" I"m talking about whole foods (not fast food, synthetics, or junk food)..and I totally agree with you all when you said if you're craving "junk" then there's probably something in it that you need whether it be sugar, saturated fat etc...

I was just a bit "concerned" when I just didn't want much sugar because it seems to be very important to metabolism and eating too much fat may lead to liberation of free fatty acids. All my carbs come from fruit or honey...but the past several weeks I just didn't want much at all...

So I"m guessing my body just needs extra fat and protein now (for some reason). I"m thinking maybe my metabolism has healed and bit and is better at storing glycogen.

Amazoniac · Nov 9, 2014

Also reinforcing the fact that cravings should be interpreted:

http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1 ... 400071/pdf

Kenobi · Nov 9, 2014

Amazoniac said:
Also reinforcing the fact that cravings should be interpreted:

http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/store/10 ... bb30be4f28

It just says...

Forbidden

tara · Nov 9, 2014

I think ther is a place for listening to cravings. Our bodies are all different from each other and even from how were yesterday. I think our bodies have a lot more unconscious understanding of what they need than we can possibly calculate consciously. I agree with pboy that having a wider palate would help. rouble is sometimes we get entrenched ideas or habits that mess with being able to tell what our bodies really want. I would be inclined to say follow cravings, but watch the results and see if they serve you.

Amazoniac · Nov 9, 2014

*Link corrected.
Worth reading all of it.

SQu · Nov 9, 2014

I too find cravings sometimes very useful pointers. Those times I feel very good after following them. Other times the signals don't seem so clear and the results not so good.
In similar vein sometimes food makes you feel good as you swallow it. How would your body know so soon how well it will digest?
The potential is to read the signals so well that they guide you better than all the theory in the world. How cool would that be?!

Dayman · Nov 16, 2014

any idea what a craving for raspberry flavored soda might mean?

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Should I Eat To Craving?

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