Please note: this transcript is not 100% accurate.
Dr. Meenal Agarwal 0:00
What they do is they make these foods highly palatable, and basically they become addictive like a drug. This is Dr Meenal, and welcome to Uncover Your Eyes where we uncover reality. As a mom and eye doctor, I want to know it all. Why do we binge eat so much? Or why do I binge eat so much and love all that salty, crunchy snacks and all the sweet, yummy candies? It’s because of the bliss point. I didn’t even hear of the bliss point until we had a recent episode with our liver specialist, Dr Joshi, who talked about it a little bit. So then I started doing some digging, and I realized there’s such a thing called the bliss point, and companies who make these yummy foods know about it. The bliss point refers to that perfect balance of sweet, so sugary, savory or salty and fat. It’s that perfect balance that makes you want to over indulge and hit that pleasurable spot in our brain so that we keep eating it and it becomes a repetitive cycle. That’s why they’re typically known as junk foods. The most common foods that we see this in are Lay’s potato chips, that perfect combination of salty, fatty and crispy Doritos, that perfect combination of salt, fat and that yummy seasoning that they put on it, Cheetos, the perfect mix of fat, Salt and that melt in your mouth sensation, Pringles, crispy, salty and so perfectly uniform that you actually recognize it as a beautiful thing and want to keep eating it. Hershey’s milk chocolate, a precise mix of sugar and fat. Reese peanut butter cups, one of my favorites, perfect sugar, fat, salt balance with, of course, that creamy texture. Skittles, my kids favorite, that burst of sugar and the fruit like flavors in every single one. McDonald’s french fries. This was a bit of a surprise for me, that fat salt and there’s actually a hint of sugar for that extra appeal. KFC, fried chicken, crispy, salty, fatty with great seasonings. Pizza Hut, pizza, cheesy, salty crust and fatty toppings. So good the beverages we have, coke that ideal sugar level or over ideal sugar level for maximum sweetness, but not overwhelming, Red Bull, sugar and caffeine for energy and satisfaction. Starbucks, frappuccinos, another one of my favorites, fat, sugar and that coffee flavor for almost making you feel that sense of indulgence. Let’s go to our breakfast foods. My youngest loves all the sugary cereals, so we have the Kellogg’s Frosted Flakes we’ve all eaten that that sugar coated, but crunchy, so that’s makes you also hit the spot. Eggo waffles, sweet, slightly salty, and then they’re perfect when you have syrup on them. Captain, crunch, crunchy, sweet and that addictive texture. And not to mention all the popsicles and ice creams of the world, they all hit that bliss point. Companies have purposely engineered these foods so that they hit the bliss point. What they do is they make these foods highly palatable and basically they become addictive, like a drug, for example. For sugar, they make it such that it makes the candy or junk food or processed food sweet, but not overly sweet. Salt enhances the flavor but does not overpower it. Fat adds richness and makes you feel over indulge, but not overly full. So that perfect balance of the three is what makes us want to keep eating these foods. It becomes repetitive and addictive. So what is this actual bliss point? Basically. It’s a series of sensory stimulations that trigger the brain’s reward system. First, we have the sensory stimulation sugar, fat and salt trigger different taste bud receptors. For example, sugar triggers the sweet receptors. Aroma plays a role in that as well, because smells play a role in how that flavor or that taste is perceived. If it smells good, you’re gonna have that sense that it is better once you’ve tasted it with your taste buds, it triggers if you have that right balance or that bliss point appeal, the neurotransmitter called dopamine to be released. When dopamine is released at a certain level, it triggers the brain’s reward system, or reward area, and that makes you feel pleasure, and therefore you over indulge, or you want to consume that food again. And then there’s a whole behavioral feedback. So once you’ve eaten that food that gives your brain that sense of pleasure, your brain actually learns that and so you actually think about that food more and want it more. So this is a process that companies know about. They know how to hit the bliss point such that you eat more and you want more of their food or that food, let me give you an example. We all love potato chips, and they are perfectly engineered to reach that bliss point when you eat that one chip, it has that perfect balance of salt, so that slight flavor enhancer fat, so that sense of richness and that crunch, which is that texture appeal, you trigger the brain’s reward system, ideally, such that there’s a feedback loop and you keep wanting more that becomes addictive. That’s why, when I’m binge watching Netflix, I binge eat potato chips. So this is almost like a whole industry, an industry that is carefully engineered to reach the bliss point. I truly believe that this is why, you know, we have a rise in diabetes, a rise in our sugars, a rise in unhealthiness. So once we actually understand the foods we’re eating and how they’re carefully made, to reach this blitz point, hopefully we won’t let these companies and these processed foods toy with our sugar levels our health. So next time you’re eating that yummy ice cream or binge eating those chips. Think of how blissful it really is. Thank you, listeners and viewers for tuning in. If you want to catch more episodes of uncover your eyes. Make sure to follow or subscribe on your favorite podcast platform and on YouTube to learn more about me, follow me on Instagram @Dr.MeenalAgarwal Until next time, keep those eyes uncovered!