Foods that operate similarly to drugs in creating pleasure, withdrawals, and intense cravings for more.įor years, I had wondered why I could rarely stop eating that bag of Lay’s baked potato chips or those Famous Amos cookies, and it made me not only feel unsatisfied and lethargic, but I also felt guilty – like I didn’t have the self-control I should have had to be able to stop at the serving size on the package.

And so that’s where the extreme amounts of salt, sugar, and fat come into play, amounts that you would never add to real food made in your own kitchen.īecause this isn’t real food – these are products that come out of a lab, having gone through rigorous testing to create foods that are spot-on in terms of bliss point. These are businesses with one main and often only objective: to maximize profit. Now, that’s certainly not to say that these processed foods began as sunshine and good intent. Moss doesn’t vilify the food giants or the government, but instead provides matter-of-fact histories and interviews with those who were at the center of it: the food scientists, the salespeople, the advertising executives, and explains the impact of what was happening in the marketplace. It’s presented in the form of stories – how instant pudding, Lunchables, and double-stuffed chocolate-covered Oreos, for example, came to exist over time. I’ve read it twice now, and I feel like I could read it a third time and still learn more. Salt Sugar Fat is one of those books that has the potential to completely rock the way you think about food. The book details the driving forces behind convenience foods (such as more women joining the workforce outside of the home and having less time for meal prep, men working longer hours, etc.), but it also talks at length about the brilliant marketing efforts of big food companies, sometimes in partnership with the government, in creating the desire for this way of eating.

If not, it’s a fascinating read on how our current processed, fast-food, snacking-all-the-time culture came to be. Oh, this book, this book. I’m thinking if you’re reading here, you’re probably already familiar with Michael Moss’s Salt Sugar Fat at least in title.

Michael moss sugar